Bihar Vidhan Sabha 2020 Election Results: The state voted in a three-phase election.
Patna:
At the start of Bihar’s leadership, the BJP appeared to be getting ahead of its partner Nitish Kumar, the five-time chief minister who is the face of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in the elections. The leads indicated that Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal United was pushing the NDA numbers down.
The BJP has always played second fiddle in Bihar, especially against Nitish Kumar. Bihar is the only state in the Hindi belt where the BJP has never held the post of chief minister.
But if the trend continues, that result could rob Nitish Kumar of Big Brother status in the alliance.
This time, the Bihar campaign was thorny for the allies.
In 2015, Nitish Kumar had fought with the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) of Lalu Yadav and Congress. Two years earlier, he had severed ties with his long-time ally, the BJP, following his screening of Narendra Modi as candidate for prime minister.
Nitish Kumar held his own when the BJP came to power at the center with a massive mandate for Narendra Modi.
But his alliance with the RJD and Congress quickly deteriorated, and in mid-2017 he resigned, dumped his partners, and returned to the BJP.
In his recap and acceptance of Prime Minister Modi’s leadership, Nitish Kumar has lost its luster. But despite the problems, the reunified NDA lasted three more years.
Along the way, the BJP repeatedly rejected assumptions that it was trying to dismiss Nitish Kumar and insisted that Nitish Kumar was the NDA’s top cabinet candidate.
However, NDA ally Chirag Paswan again spoiled the picture by announcing a solo battle with the sole purpose of defeating Nitish Kumar. Chirag Paswan has maintained throughout that he remains devoted to PM Modi and hopes to form a government with the BJP without Nitish Kumar. He was even heard in rallies calling for votes for Prime Minister Modi or his own party Lok Janshakti (LJP).
Much to Nitish Kumar’s chagrin, Chirag Paswan’s counters came only from BJP Bihar. The silence of senior management in Delhi and their unwillingness to denigrate young Paswan indicated that he was BJP plan B. It also served to reinforce the impression that the BJP wants to reduce Nitish Kumar to his size.
A section of the BJP in Bihar has been shocked by the ripple effect of anger against Nitish Kumar on jobs, the migrant crisis and the handling of the coronavirus.
But it is Chirag Paswan who seems to do the most damage to Nitish Kumar’s party. He had presented candidates for all the seats contested by the JDU.
