As Bihar votes again, Nitish, Tejashwi face reckoning
Electoral fortunes of the NDA and the India bloc will be sealed on Tuesday. Nearly 3.70 crore voters are expected to exercise their franchise across 122 Assembly segments in the final phase of the Bihar polls. The State recorded the highest ever voter turnout of over 65 per cent in the polling across 121 constituencies in the first phase of the Assembly elections.
Opposition parties decried, alleging reluctance of the Election Commission of India's (ECI) reluctance to disclose the gender ratio of the votes polled first phase of the Assembly Election. The RJD has written to the ECI complaining the delay in releasing the breakup. The ECI underlined that the gender-wise turnout ratio is given at the time of final turnout.
The BJP, on its part, exuded confidence about the NDA’s victory. Senior BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad slammed Tejashwi Yadav, terming the RJD leader’s accusations against the ECI. It has become a “habit” of Opposition leaders to attack “all organs of democracy” when they do not get the result they want, he claimed.
Prominent candidates include Bijendra Prasad Yadav, a veteran JD(U) leader and the most senior member of the State cabinet. Similar is the case of his cabinet colleague Prem Kumar, who belongs to the BJP and is trying his luck from Gaya Town, which he has won seven times since 1990. Other ministers whose electoral fates are on stake include BJP’s Renu Devi (Bettiah) and Neeraj Kumar Singh “Bablu” (Chhatapur), and JD(U)’s Leshi Singh (Dhamdaha), Sheela Mandal (Phulparas) and Zama Khan (Chainpur).
Another prominent BJP leader who is in the fray is former deputy chief minister Tarkishore Prasad, who seeks to retain the Katihar seat for a fifth consecutive term.
Security has been beefed up across Bihar for the second phase of the assembly polls with over 4 lakh personnel engaged in election duties, officials said. The districts going to polls on November 11 include West Champaran, East Champaran, Sitamarhi, Madhubani, Supaul, Araria and Kishanganj, and all these share borders with Nepal.
Most of these districts fall in the Seemanchal region, which has a high concentration of Muslim population, making it a high-stakes battle for both the INDIA bloc, which banks on the support of the minority community, as well as the ruling NDA, which alleges that the opposition is “protecting infiltrators”.
The second and final phase is also being seen as a veritable test of strength for minor NDA partners Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM), headed by Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, and Rajya Sabha MP Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Morcha (RLM), both of which have got six seats each.
