Two key partners of National Democratic Alliance (NDA) from Bihar, the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP), would not agree to the slashing of the number of their seats in the next Lok Sabha election and would contest the same number as they did in 2014 elections.
Contrary to the reports that the LJP and RLSP have agreed to the seat-sharing formula worked out by BJP president Amit Shah where the BJP and the Janata Dal (United) would share 17 seats each, the two constituents led by Union Ministers Ramvilas Paswan and Upendra Kushwaha respectively have indicated that they are not willing to forego their share of seats for 2019-Lok Sabha polls to accommodate bigger allies in the NDA.
Kushwaha, who has been hobnobbing with the Rashtriya Janata Dal of Lalu Prasad had recently said that he was ready to make “sacrifice” for the NDA.
The LJP and the RLSP, have now seemed to have changed the tune and made it clear that the number of seats they wanted to contest for the next Lok Sabha election was the same as that of 2014.
The BJP had won 22 seats in Bihar in the 2014 election, while Paswan's LJP had contested seven seats and won six. Kushwaha's RLSP had contested and won three seats. There total 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar.
LJP's Bihar unit head Pashupati Paras, a state minister, dismissed as “kite-flying” the reports that his party and the RLSP were likely to make 'sacrifices' in the wake of BJP president and JD(U) supremo and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar agreeing to contest an equal number of seats in the State.
“No seat-sharing talks will be complete until national presidents of all the four NDA alliance partners — BJP, JD(U), LJP and RLSP — sit together. That is yet to happen. All that is appearing in the media is hawa hawai (kite flying)”, Paras, the younger brother of Paswan, said in Patna.
In reply to a query, he said, “Obviously we would like to contest from at least seven seats. We had won six of the seven from which we had contested last time, and lost one by a slender margin of 7,000 votes.
“Our graph has not gone down since the last Lok Sabha poll and there is no reason why we should not get our due share.”
Asked about the agreement Shah and Kumar reached, he said it indicates “nothing”.
“The 50-50 formula could mean anything. It could even imply that the BJP and the JD(U) would be fighting only 10 each, leaving the remaining 20 for other allies,” he said.
The RLSP insisted that it would not accept a share of less than three seats.
Kushwaha had met RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav at a Bihar town, soon after Shah and Kumar announced in Delhi that they have reached a seat-sharing arrangement, fuelling speculation of a political realignment in the state.
He had also sought to know from the BJP president as why his party is not sharing power under NItish Kumar-led Government in Bihar.
The report indicate that that seat-sharing in Bihar is yet not a settled issue with some more bargaining between the allies coming to play in the coming weeks.