Patna: The BJP-led NDA appeared to register a landslide victory in Bihar, opening up impressive leads in more than 180 of the state’s 243 assembly seats, with early trends also indicating that the saffron party was on track to post its biggest tally with an excellent strike rate.
According to trends available on the Election Commission’s website by noon, the BJP was set to emerge as the single-largest party with a lead in more than 80 assembly seats out of 101 it contested, a performance that would further cement its position as the numero uno political force in the country, offsetting whatever setback that might have been caused by last year’s Lok Sabha polls.
The NDA’s tally in Bihar comes in the backdrop of the BJP’s back-to-back stupendous performances in Delhi, Maharashtra and Haryana.
Firm backing to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his team also appeared to have paid rich dividends for the JD(U), which seems poised to drastically improve its tally since 2020, when it had won only 43 seats, but was now leading in more than 70.
The LJP(RV), headed by Union minister Chirag Paswan, the self-declared “Hanuman” of the Prime Minister, was leading in over 20 seats, a stellar show taking into consideration the fact that it had contested only 29.
The RJD, which has been priding itself on being the “single largest party” despite being in the opposition, seems to be putting up a dismal show, with a lead in fewer than 40 seats, though it had contested more than 140.
The Congress, which had contested 61 seats, engaging in “friendly fights” with allies in many of these, has lived up to its reputation of being dead wood in Bihar, with a lead in less than 10 seats.
If trends are converted into results, the BJP will be outperforming the JD(U) in a second consecutive election, which may give rise to a clamour from within the cadres for having their “own chief minister”.
The PM and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, however, have so far been ambivalent on the issue, insisting that the NDA was “led by Nitish Kumar in Bihar”, a strategy that may have been adopted in view of the fact that the BJP, which does not have a majority in Lok Sabha, and is dependent on allies like JD(U), and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s TDP for survival in power.
Among the prominent BJP candidates leading in their seats were Deputy CMs Samrat Choudhary (Tarapur) and Vijay Kumar Sinha (Lakhisarai).
RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav, the INDIA bloc’s Chief Ministerial candidate, was trailing behind BJP rival Satish Kumar by a slender margin of about 100 votes.
His elder brother Tej Pratap Yadav, who was expelled from the party a few months ago by their father Lalu Prasad, was placed a distant fourth in adjoining Mahua.
