‘Nothing Is Well In NDA’-Fissures Emerge In Alliance Post Seat-Sharing Declaration

Even as most of its leaders are claiming that “all is well” within the NDA which declared its seat-sharing arrangement on Sunday, fissures between the alliance constituents came to fore on Wednesday with four junior partners openly expressing discontent and one of them stating that “nothing was well within the NDA.”

The animosity between the JD (U) and the LJP-RV which have been at loggerheads with each other since the 2020 elections led to the former releasing a list of candidates on seats including at least five seats that the Chirag Paswan-led party had been eyeing.

The first list of 57 candidates released by the JD (U) on Wednesday included names of candidates that it has fielded from Sonbarsa, Morwa, Ekma, Rajgir and Matihani seats which belong to the quota of seats allocated to Chirag-led LJP-RV, JD (U) sources confirmed.

A senior JD (U) leader told TDG that the party had made it clear to the other partners of the alliance that it is the JD (U) that would decide which seats to let go and which ones to retain.

“Nalanda has been the home-turf of Nitish ji and the Rajgir seat was given to the LJP. How can we let it go? We will never let go of the seat. We were allocated 115 seats last time but this time, we have been allotted 101 seats. We are supposed to part with 14 seats but it is the JD (U) that will decide which seat it will let go of and which one it will retain,” the leader said.

Asked about the JD (U) fielding candidates on five seats that the LJP-RV had been eyeing, JD (U) spokesperson KC Tyagi told TDG that the party will not concede “its seats.”

“These are our seats. They also went to another party but we will not concede our seats. They can keep other seats. The matter was discussed and has been sorted in a day or two,” he said.

The LJP-RV too admitted that these five seats had first been allocated to the LJP-RV.

“The seats had fallen in our kitty but as part of the alliance agreement, they have gone to the JD (U). The matter has been discussed and you will soon get the next list of candidates of the LJP-RV,” Hulas Pandey, ex-MLC and party’s candidate from Brahampur told TDG.

Sources said that Bihar CM Nitish Kumar was very unhappy with the allocation of these seats especially the Rajgir seat to the LJP-RV and the decision to allocate these seats to the JD (U) was taken after his displeasure was made known to top BJP leadership.

But it is not only the JD (U) that is unhappy with the seat allocation. The Rashtriya Lok Morcha’s (RLM) Upendra Kushwaha also declared that “nothing is well within the NDA.”

 Kushwaha was unhappy over the allocation of the Mahua seat to the LJP-RV and let it known to the BJP leadership following which deputy CM Samrat Chaudhary and Nityanand Rai met Kushwaha at his residence on Tuesday night.

When mediapersons asked him about the meeting, Kushwaha asked them what Samrat Chaudhary and Nityanand Rai -the leaders that had arrived at his residence- had told them.

“When they left with folded hands, you should have asked them. There is no question of being upset or happy. At this point of time, I will only want to say that nothing is well in the NDA.”

With his meeting with Rai and Chaudhary remaining inconclusive, Kushwaha rushed to Delhi on Wednesday to meet Union Home Minister Amit Shah even as he told mediapersons that “discussions were needed on the decisions being taken in the NDA.”

After his meeting, Kushwaha is understood to have retained the Mahua seat for his RLM.

Commenting on the meeting, Rai said that like Kushwaha had stated, “everything was fine and all will be fine soon.”

But one more partner of the NDA, the Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM)-Secular is also set to hurt the prospects of LJP-RV with the HAM-S chief Jitam Ram Manjhi making it clear that his party will field candidates from Bodh Gaya and Makhdumpur which have been allocated to Chirag Paswan’s party in the seat-sharing arrangement.

This only signals escalating tensions within the alliance especially due to the high number of seats (29) given to the LJP-RV which has upset the equations of other NDA partners on ground.

The HAM which has received six seats as part of seat-sharing arrangement has already announced its list of six candidates which includes four sitting MLAs.

“When the decision has been made, why is someone else fielding their candidate in seats allocated to JD(U)? Agreeing with them, I too will field my candidates in Bodh Gaya and Makhdumpur. The list is ready… NDA will win with a majority,” Manjhi told mediapersons.

While the BJP is busy in keeping its alliance partners in Bihar happy, the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj party (SBSP) which is its partner in UP has also released its first list of 47 candidates in Bihar signalling that it is going solo in the election.

Speaking to TDG, SBSP general secretary Arvind Rajbhar said that they wanted to stay with the NDA alliance in Bihar too but no one has approached them for a rapprochement so far.

“Noone has approached us so far and we are ready to go solo. We will field candidates on about 100 plus seats. We wanted to continue with the NDA in Bihar too but we haven’t received any assurance so far,” he said.

The SBSP which had campaigned for the NDA candidates in the Bihar bypolls says that it has felt betrayed and disrespected by the NDA not allotting even a single seat in the seat-sharing arrangement in Bihar.

“We had spoken to Union Home Minister Amit Shah way back in May and showed him the pictures of the turnout at our rallies and he had asked us to work hard on the ground. I think the state leadership did not share the right feedback about our party’s strength on ground with the top leadership,” Rajbhar said.

SBSP holds sway in some districts of Bihar which border the purvanchal region of UP including where there is a sizeable presence of the Rajbhar community whose issues it claims to represent.

In 2020, the SBSP had fought on five seats in the Bihar polls as part of the grand secular front.

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