Mahagathbandhan To Meet On September 15 To Firm Up Seat-Sharing Arrangements
Ahead of the impending Bihar elections, the Mahagathbandhan will be meeting on September 15 to firm up the seat-sharing arrangements
New Delhi: Ahead of the impending Bihar elections, the Mahagathbandhan will be meeting on September 15 to firm up the seat-sharing arrangements. In a significant move, the main parties have decided to reduce their seats by 10 per cent from the 2020 elections to accommodate the VIP Party of Mukesh Sahani and other small parties with whom the Mahagathbandhan is in talks for an alliance.
The RJD-led Mahagathbandhan has also sent out feelers to Pashupati Nath Paras of the RLJP, who has just come out of the NDA to join the alliance. Paras is since holding talks with RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav.
The RJD is reportedly offering 2-3 seats against Paras' demand for 10-15. Paras aims to contest particularly in Vaishali to leverage the Paswan community’s 5-6 per cent vote share. According to sources, some forward movement is expected ahead of the crucial September 15 meeting.
The screening committee of the Congress has made preliminary visits to Patna and interacted with local leaders and ticket seekers. Insiders claim that almost 3,200 applications have come.
According to sources, a tentative formula for the upcoming Bihar elections suggests that the RJD will be contesting 140 seats, the Congress 52 seats, the Left parties 35 and the VIP 15 seats. Sources added that minor adjustments are possible.
In the 2020 Bihar polls, the RJD contested 144 seats, the Congress 70 seats, the CPI(ML) 19, the CPI 6 and the CPM 4 seats. The VIP parted ways mid-campaign, alleging betrayal, and JMM was accommodated from the RJD’s quota.
The 2024 Lok Sabha elections saw the RJD contest 26 seats, the Congress 9, and Left parties 5, indicating a pattern of the RJD's dominance, but strained negotiations over key seats like Purnea are likely.
In the upcoming Assembly elections neither the RJD nor the Congress wants to take a chance. Internally there is an understanding that Mr Yadav will be the Mahagathbandhan's chief ministerial face.
The Opposition alliance does not want to be termed as the Yadav-Muslim (MY) alliance; that is why the ticket distribution will be in such a manner that counter-polarisation does not take place. The Yadavs constitute 14 per cent of Bihar's population, while Muslims are about 18 per cent of the population in the state. The combined MY population is close to 32 per cent in the state.
The Mahagathbandhan is keen on broadening its appeal beyond MY through the MY-BAAP formula (Muslim-Yadav plus Bahujan, Aghada (forward castes) and Aadhi Aabadi (women and poor)) inspired by Akhilesh Yadav’s PDA strategy in Uttar Pradesh. This targets Kushwaha, Dhanuk, Mallah and non-Paswan Dalits to expand its vote share.
The Opposition alliance has already hit the ground running in Bihar. It launched a voter adhikar yatra to protest the Election Commission’s special intensive revision (SIR) of voter rolls, which the alliance alleges disenfranchises minorities, Dalits and migrant voters (an estimated 65–75 lakh affected). The campaign frames the SIR as “vote chori” (vote theft), accusing the NDA of manipulating voter lists to suppress the Opposition votes.
