Deal or not, it’ll be BJP vs allies

NEW DELHI, JANUARY 24: Just a day after they struck a deal on seat-sharing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies, the Janata Dal...

NEW DELHI, JANUARY 24: Just a day after they struck a deal on seat-sharing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies, the Janata Dal (United), Samata Party and Bihar People’s Party (BPP), have fielded candidates against each other in almost half of the seats in the first phase of Bihar Assembly polls for which the deadline for nomination expired on Monday.

Compounding problems for the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) was an angry Anand Mohan (BPP), who said that his party would not contest the elections nor would it campaign for any party. He said that he had made this clear to BJP leader L K Advani. The BPP has been allotted 20 seats but Anand said that his party’s claim was for 41 seats.

The NDA constituents too have identified the seats each would be contesting at a crucial meeting to be held here on Monday night. They hope to instruct their `candidates’ contesting seats `identified’ as belonging to allies’, to withdraw before the deadline for withdrawal of nomination ie January 27.

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NDA leaders themselves admit that the arrangement was likely to create much confusion as some candidates who have already submitted authorisation letter for allotment of party’s symbol to them, may refuse to oblige. This might lead to presence of a number of rebel candidates in the fray.

“What can they do? At the best, they will disown and expel me. I don’t care because caste equations in my constituency favour me. Party symbol would be an added advantage. The party is sure to adopt me if I win,” crows a BJP candidate.

The JD(U) on its part is looking only for a few seats in the first phase since it does not have high stakes in South Bihar. But the real problem will arise when the seats in central and north Bihar, strongholds of both the JD(U) and the Samata Party.

For the record though, party spokesman M Raghupathy expressed confidence that there would be no overlapping. "We will work out a mechanism by which there will be no such conflict," he said.

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The JD (U), he said, had identified almost all the 64 seats that have been allotted to it. It would also be ready with some seats more than its quota so that if there was a stronger claim by either the BJP or the Samata it could shift its candidates to other seats.

In spite of the seat-sharing deal already worked out, the JD(U) and the Samata continued to make statements against each other. Raghupathy said that it was "unfortunate" that the Samata was repeatedly voicing its unhappiness over the seats that it had been allotted.