‘Take 4, and no more’

With its dreams of an alliance with Mayawati evaporating and a tie-up with the JMM in Jharkhand coming to nought, the Congress has now sudde...

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With its dreams of an alliance with Mayawati evaporating and a tie-up with the JMM in Jharkhand coming to nought, the Congress has now suddenly hit rough weather in Bihar. This is ironical for the RJD has been the Congress’ oldest and most trusted ally and it was Laloo Yadav who had first written to the President supporting Sonia Gandhi when she was making a bid to form a government in 1999.

The RJD is insisting that it is not prepared to offer the country’s oldest party more than four seats in Bihar. This has been conveyed to the Congress leadership and the ‘‘ball now is in their court’’. The Congress is demanding 15. Bihar has 40 Lok Sabha seats. In the last election also, the Congress had got four seats in Bihar and four in what is now Jharkhand.

‘‘We have left four seats for the Congress, two where they have sitting members and two where they came second,’’ Laloo Yadav told The Indian Express before leaving for Patna yesterday. Laloo was in the capital for the last several days to finalise the tie-up but it didn’t materialise. Nor did he meet Sonia Gandhi.

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‘‘Do you want to fight to win the election or just to contest and lose? Let the secular people tell me how many seats I should fight but it has to be based on ground strength. If we fight right, we can finish the NDA this time.’’

‘‘On what basis is the Congress asking for more seats?’’ an exasperated Laloo asked. ‘‘They say they are the big party. Par votwa ka adhar kya hai (But where is the proof in votes)? After all there has to be some basis for seat sharing.’’

Taking a dig at the number of seats his potential allies are demanding, Laloo said: ‘‘At the rate at which our potential allies are asking us for seats, the RJD will be left only with five seats to contest unless (Chief Election Commissioner) Mr Krishnamurthy creates more Lok Sabha seats in Bihar.’’ Besides the Congress demanding 15 seats, Ram Vilas Paswan’s party is wanting 10 and the CPI five. The RJD has tied up with the CPI(M), which is getting Bhagalpur, and with NCP, which will get Katihar, Laloo said. NCP leader Tariq Anwar will be contesting from Katihar.

Prem Gupta, RJD MP who has been Laloo’s emissary talking to the Congress, has had several sittings with R.K. Dhawan and Arjun Singh. He also called on Sonia Gandhi four days ago.

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Privately, the RJD has told the Congress that they should change their two sitting members, who have no chance of re-election. They are Shyama Singh from Aurangabad and Rajo Singh from Begusarai. Rajo Singh is an accused in a murder case where half-a-dozen Yadavs and Dalits were killed and there is no way that the RJD can get their vote transferred to Singh who is incidentally a Bhumihar, their leaders say. Shyama Singh’s husband, former Delhi police chief Nikhil Kumar, also wants a seat.

Besides Aurangabad and Begusarai, the RJD has allocated Madhubani and Maharajgunj for the Congress. The Congress had initially demanded 22 seats. The party’s scaled-down list of 15 seats includes Bettiah, Motihari, Vaishali, Sitamarhi, Sheohar, Saharsa, Araria, Kishengunj, Katihar, Sasaram and Nawada.

The RJD has its homework ready this time. Leaders will cite figures and percentages to drive home the point that it was because of the RJD that the Congress won two seats and came second in another two in 1999. This is borne out by statistics of the 2000 Assembly elections. In Aurangabad which had Congress’s Shyama Singh the LS polls in 1999, the Congress forfeited its deposit in five of its six Assembly segments. The situation was similar in Begusarai, Madhubani and Maharajgun.