Results people's approval of Lalu-Nitish unity - Times of India

PATNA: For some, the result of by-election to 10 assembly seats was just the reverse of what they had anticipated expecting six seats to go in favour of BJP and four to the new 'secular' alliance for some it would have a big impact on the 2015 assembly election, but for almost every one the result has put a seal of people's approval on the unity between Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar, the two sworn enemies in Bihar politics, whose coming together has caused concern in the BJP camp.

The scorecard of the 10 seats is: BJP 4, RJD 3, JD (U) 2 and Congress 1. BJP had contested nine and its ally LJP one seat, whereas the new alliance partners the RJD and JD (U)- fought four seats each and gave two seats to Congress.

All eyes were riveted on these bypolls, which generated much hype and interest not only in the state but at the national level as well, mainly because the two leaders had joined hands after over two decades of bitter animosity. The RJD-JD (U) alliance came under sharp attack from the senior leadership of BJP and even its national president Amit Shah said Nitish unabashedly sat in Lalu's lap. Bihar BJP leaders termed the alliance immoral.

The BJP leaders took sadistic pleasure in declaring that Nitish was being publicly humiliated by Lalu. Quoting one of Lalu's speeches, they claimed the RJD chief said Nitish fell on his feet (gor mein baith gaya). Later, RJD sources said Lalu had said ?god mein baith gaya' while referring to Shah's comments. Nitish on Monday said he was abused and chastised by the BJP leaders during campaign.

The poor attendance at the first joint meeting of Lalu and Nitish at Subhai Jamalpur village under Hajipur constituency this time encouraged the NDA leaders to say that the people rejected the new alliance much before the poll. The two former CMs were the main campaigners for the alliance, with a symbolic stumping by C P Joshi of Congress, while BJP's campaign was com mandeered by former deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi and Union ministers Ravi Shankar Prasad, Radha Mohan Singh, Ram Vilas Paswan and Upendra Kushwaha besides a number of MPs.

What caused a major humiliation to the BJP is that the party earlier held six of the 10 seats and the RJD and JD (U) held three and one, respectively. The BJP cut a sorry figure as it lost Jale, Chhapra, Mohiuddinnagar and Bhagalpur seats which it held earlier. Ashwini Kumar Choubey, elected to Lok Sabha from Buxar, was holding Bhagalpur and Janardan Singh Sigriwal, now MP from Maharajganj, was an MLA from Chhapra. The party, however, wrested Mohania and Banka seats from the JD (U) and RJD, respectively.

"There could have been a better result than this had we made seats-sharing decision in a better manner. But we had little time and did what we thought was the best," commented Nitish Kumar and added that in future this issue will be tackled cautiously. "This was the first experience and later on we will take care of this issue," he said. Bhai Birendra, an RJD MLA, was also of the opinion that seat sharing was not done in a mature way and said Hajipur seat should have been given to RJD.

http://ift.tt/1nTkZDl Vilas Paswan,Radha Mohan Singh,Lok Sabha

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