Bihar polls: With a day left for nominations, INDIA bloc looks unsettled

With less than 24 hours left for filing of nomination papers for the second and final phase to be over, multi-party coalition was still unable to declare things like a chief ministerial candidate

Chinks in the INDIA bloc's armour became all too obvious on Sunday in poll-bound Bihar, where disgruntled aspirants in the RJD and the Congress, the two largest constituents, had a field day charging the leadership with having put tickets up for sale.

With less than 24 hours left for the filing of nomination papers for the second and final phase to be over, the multi-party coalition was still unable to declare things like a chief ministerial candidate and the formula of seat-sharing among six alliance partners.

RJD supremo Lalu Prasad, however, continued to disburse party symbols at will, which did not go down well with the party's media cell president Ritu Jaiswal, who announced that she would be filing her nomination papers as an Independent from Parihar seat, against the official candidate Smita Purve.

In an emotional Facebook post, Jaiswal, who had contested the seat five years ago and was the RJD candidate from Sheohar in Lok Sabha polls last year, losing on both occasions with slender margins, alleged that Purve's father-in-law Ram Chandra Purve, a former state unit chief of the party, had been behind her defeat in the 2020 assembly elections.

Prasad's residence in Patna, a government bungalow allotted to his wife Rabri Devi in her capacity as a former chief minister, kept teeming with aspirants and hordes of their supporters, and while those who were lucky erupted in cheers and those whose claims were overlooked chose to vent spleen.

Madan Prasad Sah, who had lost the Madhuban seat by a modest margin last time, burst into tears, tore off his clothes and began rolling on the street adjacent to 10, Circular Road, the bungalow serving as the RJD's de facto office, when he received the news that the ticket from his constituency had gone to someone else.

Amid sobs, he told a posse of journalists, who have been camping in front of the newsy bungalow almost round the clock, that he had been a staunch supporter of Lalu Prasad since the 1990s and had "sold off my own piece of land" to contest the 2020 elections.

Sah seemed to be full of vitriol for the party supremo's son and heir apparent Tejashwi Yadav, whom he called "arrogant" and alleged that the ticket has gone to a "BJP agent" because a Rajya Sabha MP, known to enjoy tremendous clout with the proverbial "first family" of RJD, has "struck a deal with Amit Shah".

Sah's theatrics seemed to have amused Union minister Giriraj Singh no end, as the senior BJP leader told reporters that "there is so much of outrage. I would suggest Lalu ji not to open the gates of his house, lest his angry workers may rip off the clothes he is wearing".

Another RJD aspirant who was found weeping beside 10, Circular Road, was Uma Devi, who claimed, "I have been associated with the party since 2005. Lalu ji, Rabri ji, Misa (eldest daughter) didi and Tejashwi bhaiya had all till recently assured me that I will get the ticket from Barachatti. I am aghast that the ticket has gone to a candidate who has landed as if by a parachute".

Unlike Sah, Uma Devi did not allege that money had changed hands in deciding the candidature, though both of them were unanimous in reaffirming their trust in Lalu Prasad and ruling out the possibility of contesting as rebel candidates.

The Congress, which has so far released lists of more than 50 candidates, had its own share of woes. Its sitting MLA from Kasba, Mohd Afaque Alam, who has been denied a fourth consecutive run from his seat, went public with his outrage.

Addressing a press conference, Alam suspected foul play from another sitting MLA from adjoining Katihar district, who had been involved in the candidate selection process and whom he accused of harbouring "ill-will against me ever since I was chosen over him for a ministerial berth, though both of us belong to the same community".

An audio clip, the veracity of which could not be confirmed, has also gone viral in which Alam is said to be in conversation, over the phone, with state Congress president Rajesh Kumar Ram.

As per the audio clip, Ram put the blame for the mess squarely on Krishna Allavaru, the AICC's Bihar in charge, whom he accused of acting as per the advice of Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, the Independent MP from Purnea, whose wife Ranjeet Ranjan is a Congress Rajya Sabha member from Chhattisgarh.

Meanwhile, all did not seem to be well in the relatively better organised NDA either.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JD(U), which had, in a sudden move, announced ex-MP Sabir Ali as its candidate from Amour, went back on the decision, realising that Saba Zafar, whom the former was supposed to replace, had already filed his nomination papers, and was unlikely to withdraw from the contest.

The ruling coalition hopes its campaign to pick up momentum next week when Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a couple of election rallies.

According to state BJP president Dilip Jaiswal, Modi will kickstart his campaign, on October 24, from Samastipur, followed by another rally in Begusarai later in the day.