Bihar polls: NDA announces seat-sharing formula, confident of ‘big win’

New Delhi: NDA on Monday finalised its seat-sharing for Bihar polls with BJP getting to contest 160 out of 243 assembly constituencies while allies LJP and Jitan Ram Manjhi's HAM have been alloted 40 and 20 seats respectively.

Announcing the decision after days of hectic parleys, BJP chief Amit Shah, who was flanked by other key leaders of the alliance like LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan and Manjhi, said that Upendra Kushwaha's RLSP will contest on 23 seats and stressed that there is "no tug of war" among the four NDA constituents over the seat sharing agreement for the next month's polls.

Shah also chose the occasion to appeal to workers of all the four NDA allies to fight the elections together to ensure a resounding victory for the alliance against the Nitish Kumar led JD(U)-RJD-Congress coalition.

Manji, who is former Bihar Chief Minister and leader of Hindustani Awaam Morcha (Secular), was apparently unhappy earlier after he was offered 15 seats. The BJP chief today said the issue of Chief Ministership will be decided by the NDA MLAs after the polls and asserted that there are no differences among the constituents.

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"On the one side is a coalition of compulsion. On the other side is an alliance with a common chemistry and similar ideologies," Shah claimed. Asking people of Bihar to give a chance to the NDA, Shah also reminded that Bihar was the cradle of anti-Congressism and urged the electorate to take forward Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call for a "Congress-mukta Bharat".

Shah launched a hard-hitting attack on the grand coalition of JDU-RJD and Congress saying divisions have already started appearing in it with the leader of Janata Parivar Mulayam Singh Yadav walking out of the alliance.

Expressing confidence that the NDA will come to power in the key state, Shah accused Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of "backstabbing" the BJP by breaking the 17-year-long alliance in 2013 and castigated him for aligning with Congress and RJD.

"He (Nitish) is promising to give a corruption-free Bihar by aligning with Congress, which was involved in scams worth Rs 12 lakh crore. He is also promising to provide a crime- free Bihar while aligning with RJD's Lalu Prasad, whose tenure was known for 'jungle raj'," Shah said at the press conference.

Among those present were Kushwaha and other BJP leaders from the state including Sushil Kumar Modi.