New Delhi: A day after Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar met Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) President Lalu Prasad is likely to meet Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Monday to discuss a possible alliance for Bihar polls. Rahul is learnt to have favoured a broader secular alliance for the state and he has also told Kumar about the party view in this matter.
Bihar's ruling Janata Dal United JD(U) and Lalu Prasad's RJD on Sunday joined habds to fight the state assembly elections in alliance to take on the Bharatiya Janata party (BJP). The RJD and the JDU have decided to constitute a six member committee to finalise seat-sharing as it remains a contentious issue despite the alliance being announced. Bihar Assembly has 243 seats.
"It has been decided in today's meeting that a committee of three members each from RJD and JD-U will decide seat sharing and leaders of both parties will give a final shape to it. It has been decided now that both parties will fight the election in Bihar in alliance," Samajwadi Party General Secretary Ram Gopal Yadav said.
Nitish and Lalu met on Sunday at Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's residence, who was approached by the two parties to broker peace after days of sparring between leaders of the two parties.
There is also no clarity on who will be the chief ministerial candidate of the alliance. JDU sources claim that the party is not ready for any compromise on Nitish Kumar's leadership role. There's also no confirmation whether the SP or the Congress will join this alliance.
The coming together of friends-turned-foes-turned-friends Nitish and Lalu was prompted by a resurgent BJP-led National Democratic Alliance which is eying power in Bihar.
However, the BJP has claimed that they will come to power in the state. "There is no Janata Parivar. BJP will come back in state with full majority," BJP leader Rajiv Pratap Rudy said.
A bitter war of words had been on between leaders of the two parties amid a speculation that the RJD chief was not keen to project Nitish as the chief ministerial candidate of the alliance. RJD Vice President Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, who had openly expressed his reservations against declaring Nitish's name as the chief minister candidate of the alliance outraging the JDU, had appealed to Sonia Gandhi to hammer out a solution and give shape to the anti-BJP alliance in Bihar.
The Congress has maintained that it wants to stop the division of votes in the state. "I wish for a coalition in Bihar which can fight BJP in the upcoming elections and stop the divison of the votes," Congress leader Manish Tewari said.
Comments
0 comment