The AJSU party, a major partner in the ruling coalition, has rejected senior partner BJP’s call for unity and gone ahead fielding its candidates in both the vacant Assembly constituencies - Silli and Gomia - where bypolls are slated for May 28.
The party has named AJSU chief Sudesh Mahto and lambodar Mahto as its candidates for Silli and Gomia seats respectively.
Informing about the decision taken by central committee of the party, spokesperson Deosharan Bhagat said in a press conference called on Monday that the candidates would file their papers on May 7.
“AJSU party has decided to fight the Assembly bye elections from both Gomia as well as Silli. Party central president Sudesh Kumar Mahto from Silli and senior party leader and former official of Jharkhand Administrative Service official lambodar Mahto from Gomia would be the candidates. Both the candidates would file their nominations on May 7,” said Bhagat.
The declaration has come a day after Chief Minister Raghubar Das himself started rigorous consultation process over Gomia constituency and gathered opinion about probable candidates from the party workers converging from five blocks. The BJP is of the view and placed this out in open that its candidate Madhav lal Singh had contested on the last occasion and faired second only after the JMM. With this the saffron party also went on handing over Silli seat to the partner AJSU where the later as well had fought unsuccessfully in 2014 with Sudesh Mahto being the candidate.
“Ours was the genuine claim over Gomia. On the last occasion as well our produce was harvested by the JMM. The decision to fight on both the seats is not going to affect the health of the coalition and instead it is going to be strengthened only with both the candidates securing victory. We are delivering our coalition karma and now the BJP should reconsider its decision,” replied Bhagat when asked about coalition dharma call coming from the BJP.
Notably, the JMM’s winning candidate Yogendra Prasad was a AJSU leader and when the seat had fallen into BJP kitty under seat sharing formula he took ‘bow and arrow’ in his hands. Nonetheless his stint in the Assembly could not last long after his conviction and disqualification.
The BJP eyeing to replicate the same formula this time as well had approached the AJSU well in advance to leave Gomia for it. “We still believe and stake claims to Gomia. I think the issue would be resolved after consultation with senior party leaders from both the sides. We also believe that our alliance with AJSU would remain intact,” State BJP vice president Deepak Prakash after the AJSU made the announcement.
Bhagat, on the other, sidestepped a question asked whether the party had taken its partner into confidence and informed it before arriving to the decision and said AJSU was an independent party and free to take its calls.