Nitish Kumar
Bihar Elections -2020
Patna: In a cliffhanger of an election, with counting dragging on for over 16 hours, the ruling National Democratic Alliance scraped through and will form the government in Bihar with Nitish Kumar at the helm — his fourth successive term as the Chief Minister.
The NDA won 125 seats in the 243-member state assembly against the Rashtriya Janata Dal – led Grand Alliance’s 110 seats. Nitish’s own party, the Janata Dal (United) though bore much of the brunt of anti incumbency and its numbers were reduced from 71 seats in 2015 to 43 seats in 2020. In 2015 state assembly elections Nitish was a part of the Grand Alliance but had left it soon thereafter to rejoin its old partner, the NDA.
Incidentally this time the RJD emerged as the single largest party with 75 seats closely followed by the BJP which won 74 seats. Among the NDA partners, besides the BJP’s 74, and JD (U)’s 43, Hindustani Awam Morcha and Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) won four seats each.
Also read: State Bye Elections Results – November 2020
This time much damage was also done to Nitish by Chirag Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party. Paswan, who while supporting the BJP, had distanced himself from NDA over sharp differences with Nitish, did spoil JD(U)’s chances in at least 30 seats even though it could win just one seat.
With the JD(U) now only in a position to play second fiddle to the BJP, the question arises whether the latter will be more assertive and aggressive in the state politics now.
Incidentally, the biggest gainer was the CPI-ML, which gained 9 seats from the last elections and emerged victorious in 12 seats this time. Other Left parties, the CPI and CPI-M that were unable to open their respective accounts in the 2015 state elections, this time won two seats each.
Yet, Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) surprised all by winning five seats this time. Prior to this, it had indeed gained a foothold in the state politics when it had won a seat in a by-election in the state earlier. Its ally, the Bahujan Samaj Party too won a solitary seat this time.
In all counts, however, the Bihar elections would be remembered for the strong show put up by RJD’s young turk Tejashwi Yadav – the younger son of jailed RJD supremo Lalu Yadav, who gave up a tough fight to a much formidable opponent and made them sweat till the very last. Both Tejashwi Yadav and his elder sibling Tej Pratap won the Raghopur and Hasanpur seats with margins of 38,174 and 21,139 votes respectively.
Prominent losers from the RJD included Abdul Bari Siddiqui, a former state party chief, who lost from Keoti. HAM president and former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi defeated former state assembly speaker Uday Narayan Chaudhary in Imamganj of Gaya district. Ace former shooter and Commonwealth gold medalist Shreyasi Singh of BJP won the Jamui seat by over 41,000 votes, but veteran socialist leader Sharad Yadav’s daughter Subhashini lost in Bihariganj.
– globalbihari bureau
