Both the BJP and the JD-U abetted the LJP split but interestingly, independently. And there hangs a tale of conflicting interests, gamesmanship, subterfuge, and retribution, reports Radhika Ramaseshan.
Since 2018, the BJP has failed to win a majority in any of the state polls. It lost power in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh in 2018 followed by Maharashtra and Jharkhand. The party managed to form government in Karnataka by winning over opposition MLAs and in Haryana by allying with a regional party.
As the ruling alliance starts feeling the tremors, discussions on new equations have also started, reports Satyavrat Mishra.
Nishant is an engineer like his father. He is tech-savvy and likes to visit religious places as well.
Addressing a press conference, Paswan said he was happy that the BJP had emerged "much bigger and stronger" in Bihar, and ruled out any possibility of a truck with the opposition Grand Alliance, comprising RJD, Congress and three Left parties, citing "ideological differences".
The performance of Janata Dal-United has down compared its performance in the 2015 elections and the ruling party could not win even half of the number of seats it contested in this election.
A number of senior faces from the outgoing cabinet including Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Nirmala Sitharaman, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Piyush Goyal, Narendra Singh Tomar and Prakash Javadekar are expected to figure in the new cabinet.
The new Lok Sabha will have 300 MPs who have been elected for the first time to the Lower House.
Lalu Prasad and his Muslim-Yadav line has completely gone off track.
About 2.34 crore voters, spread across 78 assembly segments of the 243-strong assembly, will decide the fates of 1,204 candidates, including the Speaker and 12 members of the state cabinet.
According to the report, 32 (73 per cent) out of 44 candidates analysed from the Rashtriya Janata Dal have declared criminal cases against themselves and 22 (50 per cent) of them have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.
There are also over 10 million voters in the 18-29 age bracket. Winning them over could be Nitish Kumar's biggest challenge, reports Aditi Phadnis.
The National Democratic Alliance in Bihar suffered a jolt on Wednesday as a Lok Janshakti Party MP resigned from the party post of general secretary and two BJP MLAs who were denied ticket met Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
Paswan also said that BJP leaders were free to throw barbs at the LJP, as part of their "coalition dharma", but he would always hold Prime Minister Narendra Modi in high regard.
In an unprecedented order to check criminalisation of politics, the Supreme Court on Tuesday held nine political parties including the ruling BJP and JD (U) in Bihar guilty of contempt and fined eight of them for violating its February, 2020 order on publication of criminal antecedents of their candidates for the assembly polls.
Irom Sharmila, the rights activist who formed a party recently, was unable to garner any significant votes.
The death of the 74-year-old leader, who was identified with the state's Dalits for over five decades, so near the polls will mean that none of the LJP's rivals will like to attack the party and its young president strongly.
Ram Vilas Paswan, 74, who was the Lok Janshakti Party patron, had undergone a heart surgery at a hospital in New Delhi a few days ago.
Many bahubalis have fielded their wives and relatives as proxies.
'Voters from the forward castes voted for JD-U because they feared Laloo Yadav's return, but since that fear is no longer there they may not see the need to vote for Nitish Kumar anymore.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday assured at the all-party meeting that the government is ready to discuss all issues.
The list of the 314 MPs, however, does not include Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, who is also a BJP MP, they said. The majority mark is 268.
The four MLAs, accompanied by Sangma and BJP's trouble-shooter and Assam minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, visited the Raj Bhavan in the afternoon to submit letter of support to the BJP-led government.
There is also a buzz about Shah joining the government. About 60 ministers may take oath.
Else, warns rebel party MLA, the RJD will split.
The JD(U)-BJP alliance also lambasted the actress for lodging a 'baseless' first information report against the sisters of the deceased actor and questioned the 'support' extended to her by the Uddhav Thackeray government in Maharashtra, for 'reasons the Shiv Sena knows better'.
Dalits constitute nearly 16 per cent of the vote and 38 seats are reserved for them in the assembly, reports Satyavrat Mishra
Talking to reporters for the first time after the NDA's victory, Kumar, who is set for yet another term in office, said the date for his swearing-in ceremony will be discussed at an 'informal' meeting of all the four NDA constituents on Friday.
How Modi retrieves the situation and how he enlists new allies in the next two years will show if the BJP is fighting fit, report Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
'Does a political or social worker ever retire? Is Nitish Kumar himself contesting the assembly elections'
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday claimed that neither the Bharatiya Janata Party nor the Congress would get a majority in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, while also dismissing the possibility of emergence of a Third Front.
However, as the region with the state's highest concentration of Muslims readies for polls on November 7 in the last phase of the elections, it is the Rashtriya Janata Dal-Congress-Left alliance that draws considerable support from the community amid sporadic voices in Owaisi's support as they weigh their choices.
The 94 constituencies which are going to poll on November 3 are in 17 districts: West Champaran, East Champaran, Sheohar, Sitamarhi, Madhubani, Darbhanga, Muzaffarpur, Gopalganj, Siwan, Saran, Vaishali, Samastipur, Begusarai, Khagaria, Bhagalpur, Nalanda and Patna.
A part of the Hajipur Lok Sabha seat, Raghopur assembly segment in Vaishali district will vote in the second phase on November 3. The 31-year-old, the younger son of Lalu Prasad, had taken the electoral plunge from Raghopur in 2015, when he had barely reached the qualifying age of 25 for fighting polls.
The Maharashtra government had opposed an FIR by the Bihar police and a CBI probe in the sensational case.
The RJD leader, who is the Mahagathbandhan's chief ministerial face, said that if voted to power, providing jobs to unemployed youth would be his topmost priority.
Twenty-three per cent or 244 candidates have declared serious criminal cases against themselves, it said. Serious criminal cases are non-bailable offences with over five years of imprisonment.
Lalu Prasad Yadav's wife Rabri Devi and daughter Misa Bharti lost from Saran and Pataliputra seats respectively in Bihar to BJP candidates. MI Khan reports.
'We can't underestimate future threats.'
Three police vehicles were damaged by agitators during bandh call in Saran district on Wednesday over the death of 22 children due to eating poisonous mid-day meal in a government school, police said.
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