The seat-sharing deal between the RJD and the Congress for Bihar Assembly polls has been finalised, but the announcement was delayed due to engagements of the senior Congress leaders in the protest over the Hathras incident.
Sources in Congress said the alliance partners are likely to officially announce the formula by Saturday afternoon at a joint Press conference in Patna.
A day after the RJD and Congress — two major alliance partners of the mahagathbandhan — attacked each other over seat sharing, leaders of both the parties, Tejashwi Yadav and Rahul Gandhi, had a telephonic discussion on to finalise an agreement.
Sources said the RJD patriach Lalu Prasad, currently lodged in Ranchi jail, asked his son Tejashwi to speak to Rahul and seal the deal. Lalu reportedly advised his son to offer the Congress between 65 to 68 Assembly constituencies. The Congress has been demanding 70 seats. AICC sources said the RJD has agreed to contest on 134-136 seats leaving 65-68 for the Congress.
While, Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) can fight on 17-19, and five each for two other Left parties - CPI and CPM - 10-12 seats for the Vikasheel Insaan Party and two for the JMM.
RJD and Congress leaders had exchanged words, blaming each other for the delay and not making an agreement for the polls starting from October 28 and for which the nomination for first phase already started on October 1.
The three-phase poll is scheduled to take place on October 28, November 3 and 7 and results will be declared on November 10.
“The RJD will contest on double the number of seats than Congress and all our alliance partners too have been suitably accommodated. Announcement will be done soon,” a senior RJD leader said. The Bihar Assembly has 243 members.
Earlier the two Left parties, CPI and CPI(M), had declared that they would contest the poll along with mahagathbandhan but the CPI(ML) had indicated that it was unhappy with the number of seats allotted. However, on Friday CPI (ML) also is said to have agreed to the deal to contest between 17-19 seats.
