CM Nitish Kumar’s party wins just 4 of the 18 seats that went to polls; RJD bags five

Bihar Chief Minister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar, riding high so far on planks of development, today suffered a major setback in Assembly by-polls after his party got just four out of the 18 seats where the elections were held.

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The by-elections gave a fresh lease of political life to Kumar’s arch rival, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad, whose party won five seats. JD(U)’s partner — Ramvilas Paswan-led Lok Janshakti party (LJP) — won another three seats.

Prasad, whose party got reduced from 22 to just four MPs in the Lok Sabha elections in April-May and subsequently lost ministerial berth in the second United Progressive Alliance (UPA), was expectedly happy. He quickly denounced the development works of Kumar and said: “People of Bihar have now realised that he (Nitish) had bluffed them. This was an acid test for us. We have won the semi-final today. The final will be the Assembly elections in 2010. We will register a thumping victory in that match as well.”

The Congress managed to retain its rise in Bihar, snatching away two seats from JD(U), while an independent and BSP candidate won one seat each.

In a preliminary analysis, sources close to Nitish Kumar claimed that partial shift of the upper caste vote might have resulted in this debacle for the chief minister. “The chief minister expressed his interest in land reforms and that might have triggered anger among the upper caste population with large land holdings,” said a source.

Shaibal Gupta, head of the Asian Development Research Institute and a part of Kumar’s think tank, maintained there is no need for Kumar to change his road map. “The development plank will continue. The chief minister doesn’t need to alter his strategy. His policy and measures to co-opt the marginal population will continue, as it has given dividend in the Lok Sabha elections.”

Meanwhile, in Delhi, the ruling Congress party today received a jolt when it lost two Assembly seats earlier held by it — the Dwarka and Okhla constituencies.

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