What The Pundits Will Say After Bihar Results

Shivam Vij / HuffPo
Even though the BJP won 32 out of 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar in 2014, CSDS found in surveys at the time that 64% respondents were satisfied with his performance as chief minister. It is important to note that this view was being expressed after Nitish had broken his alliance with the BJP, and while voters were voting for the BJP.

Except for the BJP-aligned upper caste voters, people in Bihar have good things to say about Nitish Kumar, but there may be good reasons why this may not convert into votes. They may want to give the BJP a chance after having seen Nitish govern Bihar for two terms, they may not like the Lalu alliance, the BJP’s communal polarization may have a role to play, and finally, the BJP is doing a good job with caste arithmetic.

Despite all those reasons, Nitish Kumar could win this election precisely because he is popular with voters. Should he lose, it will not change the truth that there is no huge anti-Nitish sentiment amongst voters in Bihar. The good things voters have to say about his two terms will keep him alive and kicking in Bihar politics. more

Don’t Mess with Bihar’s Women Voters

Aviral Virk / Quint
Forty-six percent of the total voters in Bihar are women. The gap between the number of men and women who turned up to vote reduced to three percent in the 2010 state elections. While Nitish may have a first-mover advantage when it comes to wooing the women electorate of Bihar, BJP President Amit Shah is not too far behind in recognising the need to push the Centre’s women-centric schemes.

In effect, both Modi and Nitish may well be competing to capitalise on the single factor that has the potential to cut across Bihar’s myriad caste denominations.

Another reason why the two cannot afford to ignore the female constituency is the fact that more Bihari women than men voted in the last General Elections. 58 percent women voters got inked as opposed to 55 percent men, a first for a predominantly patriarchal society like Bihar. more

Where is the BJP's famed cohesion?

Mayank Mishra / BS
It was an exercise aimed at giving the impression of a cohesive unit at work. When Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad Yadav’s son Tejaswi went to address an election rally at Raghopur in Bihar’s Vaishali district, he ensured that the venue had flags of all three parties of the coalition he is representing. He reportedly thanked the leaders of the Congress, the RJD and the Janata Dal (United) for choosing him as the coalition’s nominee from the constituency. 

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) unit in the state, on the other hand, is giving the impression of a divided house. Recent statements of three members of Parliament and one sitting member of the state Legislative Assembly indicate that all is not well within the party. Protests have come from within about the selection of candidates and also about applying different rules while fielding relatives of party leaders. Even the BJP’s coalition partners have expressed disappointment at the seat sharing arrangement among allies.

The cohesion, or lack of it, both in letter and spirit, is going to be one of the three key variables that will have a bearing on the eventual outcome of the elections. more

A PM with nationwide appeal vs a very popular CM

Sanjeer Alam / IE
Despite being chief minister for two full terms, Nitish Kumar has no serious allegations of corruption or favouritism against him. In the media and other circles, he has been rated among the best performing chief ministers of India. Given his clean image combined with a track record of improving governance and bringing in some measure of development, Nitish is arguably the most popular leader in the state. 

To counter the leadership advantage of the grand alliance, the NDA has cleverly pitted Modi against Nitish. Doubtless, Modi stands out as the most popular political personality of the day. Unlike others, his popularity runs high across social and spatial boundaries. Not only does he wear the hat of “developmentalist”, he has an ability to connect with a public of all hues. He chooses to speak the language most people understand, he talks of what most people wish to listen to. more

Bihar election is tragic, regardless of the outcome

Supriya Sharma / Scroll
As chief minister, Kumar cultivated the image of a development-oriented statesman. Invoking Bihari sub-nationalism by celebrating a birthday for Bihar, among other things, he tried to create a constituency for himself that cut across caste lines. In line with that image, his campaign posters plastered all over Patna now say ‘Aage Badhta Rahe Bihar, Phir EK Bar Nitish Kumar’ (May Bihar keep marching ahead, Once more Nitish Kumar). ‘Bihar Mein Bahar Ho, Nitish Kumar Ho’ (May there be spring in Bihar, may there be Nitish Kumar).

Yet, in his own subtle way, Kumar has responded to what one of his advisors termed "the betrayal of the upper castes". In June this year, with elections on the horizon, Kumar reserved 50% of all government contracts up to Rs 15 lakh for Dalits, OBCs and EBCs.

This may well be the tragedy of this election: Regardless of who wins, the idea that a leader can transcend caste in Bihar already stands defeated. more

Amit Shah in fire-fighting mode

Nistula Hebbar / ToI
Rebellion in the party ranks after ticket distribution is perhaps a common phenomenon. But BJP chief Amit Shah is not taking any chances with a crucial State like Bihar.

As the BJP faces open allegations from the likes of the former Home Secretary and party MP from Ara R.K. Singh that criminals have got party ticket, Mr. Shah is heading to Patna to cool tempers. The central team deputed for the polls in Bihar will also be with him on this exercise.

The damage control mission is all the more important because Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be addressing his first rally after the announcement of poll dates in Bihar on October 2. more

BJP Agent tag haunts Owaisi

Abdul Qadir / ToI
AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi's Bihar campaign appears to have hit a road block as the BJP agent tag refuses to go away and removing the tag, as of now must be the firebrand leader's first priority. more

Social Chemistry may determine Bihar outcome

Abdul Qadir / ToI
Politics is not all arithmetics. It is social chemistry as well and two plus two rarely make four in politics. Either it is more than four or less than three, says Rai Madan Kishore, a retired bureaucrat of the Bihar Administrative Service and a keen observer of the Bihar Political scene. Perhaps it is social chemistry, more than anything else that will influence the poll outcome. 

Though Social chemistry is important for both the political formations contesting the Bihar elections, it is more important for the NDA. For the Nitish led Mahagatbandhan, much will depend on how the OBCs and EBCs gel with Yadavas and Muslims. more

In Raghopur, Yadavs long for Lalu and ‘forgive’ Nitish

Santosh Singh / IE
People begrudge Lalu for not having done enough, yet they have longed for him since he fell out of power. They begrudge Nitish Kumar for not having done enough or bothered to visit here even once in the last 10 years, yet they are now happy that the two “backward” leaders have come together. They have “forgiven” Nitish because of this. more

मुसलमान: आबादी ज्यादा, सियासी नुमाइंदगी कम

बीरेन्द्र बरियार / सरिता
आजादी के बाद से 2010 तक के 14 बिहार विधानसभा चुनावों में कुल 4,262 विधायक बने जिन में से सिर्फ 313 ही मुसलमान हैं. यह आंकड़ा बता देता है कि मुसलमानों को समाज की मुख्यधारा में लाने, उन्हें टिकट देने और उन की तरक्की के सवाल पर हर दल एक ही थैली के चट्टेबट्टे साबित हुए हैं. more

5 things about the Bihar elections

Abhishek Choudhary / Newslaundry
Why has the BJP dumped a quarter of its sitting MLAs?
The official reason given by Team Amit Shah is that they want young faces and a larger representation from the non-upper castes. Fair enough!
But it turns out larger representation from the non-upper castes means larger representation from the dominant backward castes, Yadavs especially. 
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Also, “young” for BJP, it turns out, means giving tickets to sons of three of its senior leaders – C. P. Thakur, Ashwini Choubey and Ganga Prasad – as well as other scions who recently fell out with Nitish. more

Yadav vs Yadav

Rajiv Singh / ET
The importance of Yadavs in Bihar's caste arithmetic can be realised from the fact that they form the largest caste group in the state. A close second as a group are Muslims. It is this Yadav-Muslim combination that formed the mainstay of Lalu's undisputed dominance in the state's politics since the '90s up to the mid-2000s. In the coming elections, Lalu's sons, Tej Pratap Yadav and Tejashwi Yadav, are contesting from the Yadav-dominated Mahua and Raghopur constituencies, respectively. 

But the Yadavs it seems are keen to shift allegiances. That was evident in the 2010 elections when, from a high of 124 seats won by RJD in 2000, its tally shrunk to 22. More than the danger from the likes of Pappu Yadav — who was expelled from Lalu's RJD a few months back for allegedly indulging in anti-party activities — is the threat from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has fielded 22 Yadavs for the upcoming polls. A first for the saffron party, which gave tickets to just six Yadavs in the last assembly elections in caste-ridden Bihar, the BJP is trying to make a huge dent in Lalu's vote bank. And this damage, reckon political analysts, will be instrumental in deciding the winner of the Bihar elections.
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Eating into Lalu's vote bank, however, is not going to be easy. In spite of all controversies and setbacks, the RJD chief still has his strong pockets of dominance. And one doesn't need to go too far to find such a place. Sahugarh, 3 km from Madhepura, still beats for the veteran politician. more

The Patna Protocol

PR Ramesh / Open
An epic battle is underway in the proverbial badlands of Bihar, where many political lives swing between irrelevance and renewal. Even as cracks appear in the artificial alliance of Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad, the BJP wants more than a victory. It is fighting for a mandate worthy of India’s most popular politician and its unsurpassed campaigner. Narendra Modi’s next phase of modernisation will begin from the backwardness of Bihar. more

इंजीनियर तो नीतीश ही!

हरिशंकर व्यास / नया इंडिया
यह मामूली बात नहीं है जो महागठबंधन बिना तनाव के चुनाव मैदान में है। लालू और नीतीश का महागठबंधन बनना, नीतीश कुमार का बतौर मुख्यमंत्री घोषित होना अनहोनी बात है तो गांधी मैदान में सफल रैली और लालू समर्थक यादवों का रैली बाद शांतिपूर्ण घर लौटना भी बिहार के लोगों के लिए चौंकाने वाला अनुभव था। बाद में सीट और उम्मीदवार चुनने का वक्त आया तो उसमें भी नीतीश कुमार ने शांति से सभी फैसले करवा डाले।
नीतीश कुमार ने लालू यादव को उनके यादव आधार वाली सीटें दी। तभी लालू यादव ने भरपूर मात्रा में यादव-मुस्लिम समीकरण अनुसार उम्मीदवार खड़े किए हैं। वही कांग्रेस को फारवर्ड सीटें छोड़ी तो अपनी जनता दल यू में कुर्मी-कोईरी और अतिपिछड़े उम्मीदवारों का पैंतरा चला।
इस सबका बिहार में आज असर यह है कि एक तरफ भूमिहार बनाम यादव याकि मंडल-दो की राजनैतिक कंपकपाहट है तो दूसरी और विकास, सेकुलर जुमलों में नीतीश कुमार प्रदेश के एकलौते चेहरे हैं। more

BJP MP slams party for 'selling tickets'

The BJP's battle for Bihar has just got murkier with the party's own lawmaker and former Home Secretary RK Singh alleging that money has changed hands for tickets.

"They are giving tickets to criminals. How will they give a clean government? This is injustice to the people of Bihar. When Sabir Ali joined the party, I was against it. Now his wife is given a ticket. Some people have sold tickets to criminals," he said. more

From Rashtrakavi to a caste icon for polls

The BJP has been extensively promoting Hindi author Ramdhari Singh Dinkar and some of his works ahead of Bihar elections. Contemporary Hindi writers have questioned how much the BJP knows about Ramdhari Singh Dinkar. They say Dinkar’s caste, Bhumihar, has become electorally relevant for the BJP. 
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The BJP-led government went to the extent of asking the Sahitya Akademi to celebrate the golden jubilee of two of his books, only to be rejected because the 50th anniversaries had come and gone years earlier. Bihar BJP leader C P Thakur’s view of this is, “A golden jubilee need not be celebrated the same year. You can do it until 10 years later.” 
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About his book Sanskriti Ke Char Adhyaya, which BJP leaders have been promoting, writers say it is almost an antithesis to saffron ideologies. “Maybe the Sangh Parivar is fascinated by the word sanskriti. Otherwise, they would have recognised that this book examines history from a Nehruvian perspective,” says Prabhat Ranjan, who teaches Hindi literature at Delhi University. more

Bihar Polls Could Shape India's Future

NK Singh / HuffPo
The elections in Bihar have implications beyond the state. With 42 members in the Lok Sabha and 16 in the Rajya Sabha, Bihar is a highly politicised state. Its transition from an agrarian feudal society has been slow and halting and identity politics have invariably dominated electoral outcomes.
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It used to be rhetorically said that what Bengal thinks today India thinks tomorrow. In the present context it can be said that what Bihar decides today may shape the India of tomorrow. That is why this Bihar election is in some ways transformational. more

कायस्थों की उपेक्षा

Victory in Bihar is Crucial For Narendra Modi

Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay / Caravan
As always, Modi is adept as selling dreams. However, he is handicapped by the lack of any feat he can term an achievement in the past 16 months, save the zero balance accounts under Jan DhanYojana. Modi’s oft-repeated success stories from Gujarat, which have now assumed the stature of urban myths, cannot be recounted endlessly, particularly when the state is in turmoil as identity politics has reared its head there.

A victory in the Bihar elections is crucial for Modi to reverse his sliding fortunes from 2015. If 2014 was a year in which the prime minister and his lofty promises struck electoral gold, 2015 is when his failure to deliver on those commitments has cost him dearly. From the infamous pinstripes he sported that made his previously invincible persona slightly comical, to his inelegant handling of the land acquisition bill, most of these setbacks have been of his own making. 

BJP's rout in the Delhi assembly elections was colossal not just because of its margin, but also because it was Modi’s first electoral setback. Losing the elections in Bihar would create a significant dent in his trajectory, as two consecutive losses would raise aspersions on his political acumen. A victory at this point is essential for Modi to reclaim his Midas touch and restore his authority. more

Opinion polls project 'Kante ki Takkar' in Bihar

The BJP-led NDA and the mahagathbandhan of JD-U, RJD and Congress are running neck and neck in the Bihar assembly elections, according to projections by opinion polls aired on Thursday.

According to the IndiaTV-C-Voter opinion poll survey, NDA was projected to win 109-125 seats, while the mahagathbandhan is projected to get 104 to 120 seats in the 243-member Bihar assembly.

The Times Now-C-Voter opinion poll has projected the NDA to win 117 seats and the mahagathbandhan projected to win 112 seats. more

BJP leader leads donkeys to party office

A BJP leader in Bihar, who was denied a ticket to contest the assembly election, marched to the party office along with a group of donkeys. Vijay Nath Tiwari was keen to contest the polls from Chanpatia assembly constituency but he was denied a ticket by the BJP. 
Asked why he used a group of donkeys to protest, Tiwari said: "It appears to me that an army of leaders like asses are running the show to decide tickets in the party. It was a symbolic protest."more

MYKED versus DUEY

Santosh Singh / IE
Both alliances have played to their respective social base strengths and also tried to poach on each other’s constituency — the Grand Alliance by giving a good number of tickets to upper castes and the NDA by fielding a good number of Yadavs, Kushwaha and Scheduled Castes. Dalits and EBCs who will be the real deciders, have been involved in a real tug of war with the Grand Alliance and the NDA trying to woo Dalits by giving them 36 and 32 seats, respectively and 25 and 20 seats to EBCs, respectively.

So it comes down to this: the Grand Alliance’s MYKED (Muslim, Yadav Kushwaha/Kurmi, EBC and Dalits) versus NDA’s DUEY (Dalits, upper castes, EBCs and Yadavs). more

Bhagwat’s comment and Raj quota could hurt BJP

Liz Mathew / IE
At least half a dozen leaders The Indian Express spoke to conceded that the timing of Bhagwat’s interview and the EBC quota in a BJP-ruled state could harm the party. 
While one of them clarified “this does not mean that either of the developments is against the party’s position,” several leaders said “some recent developments in party-ruled states”, including the Maharashtra government’s decision to restrict autorickshaw permits to those who speak Marathi, were “not in line with the party’s strategy in Bihar”. 
“We cannot afford to be seen as taking an anti-reservation stand,” said a leader. more

Shotgun has made it to the list

Akhilesh Sharma / ndtv
Shatrughan Sinha, who has persistently courted trouble with his party recently, is included in the list of the BJP's star campaigners for the Bihar assembly elections.

The star brigade is led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has held four rallies in the state so far that drew huge crowds. Also on the list of star campaigners, which every political party must submit to the Election Commission, are party veterans LK Advani and Murli Manihar Joshi and union ministers Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Rajnath Singh.

BJP chief Amit Shah will also campaign for his party in Bihar as will TV-actress-turned-politician Smriti Irani, who is the Union Education Minister. BJP Chief Ministers like Shivraj Singh Chauhan from Madhya Pradesh will also campaign. more

Good arithmetic but no chemistry

Rahul Verma, Pranav Gupta / Hindu
The key to understanding the upcoming polls in Bihar lies in a rather simple question: will the coming together of Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar work on the ground? Any analysis of the 2014 Lok Sabha election results, which many consider as the lowest point for the JD(U), RJD, and Congress, suggests only one possibility — that the mahagathbandhan is comfortably ahead of the NDA. more

Why did the BJP oppose RSS chief?

Rajesh Ramachandran / ET
It is not normal for BJP to oppose an RSS initiative. And that too when the suggestion comes from the RSS chief. But Mohan Bhagwat’s proposal to review reservation in education and jobs is too hot for BJP to handle during Bihar polls that it has put out an official statement saying that, “the BJP very firmly supports the Constitutional reservation for the SC, ST, OBC, backwards and extremely backward class.”
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Even if Bhagwat’s concern is genuine, it would be perceived as upper caste bias because RSS is one organisation which still has not opened its leadership to Dalits and backward castes. more

RJD to take on BJP in its stronghold areas

Sanjay Singh / ET
The larger narrative for the Grand Alliance in Bihar may read as Nitish Kumar versus Narendra Modi, but the sub-text on the ground is quite different.

It's actually former chief minister Lalu Prasad's Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) which will take on the BJP in its stronghold areas in the upcoming Bihar assembly polls. Of the 91 seats where the BJP had won in 2010, it will be in direct contest with the RJD in 50- exactly half the number of seats the RJD is contesting this time as part of the alliance. more

Amit Shah’s formula: Winnability, caste, age

Sheela Bhatt / IE
In deciding tickets for the 160 assembly seats the BJP will contest in Bihar, party president Amit Shah listed three criteria — winnability, caste and age of the ticket seekers. 

Yet a scrutiny of the 154 names put out so far by the BJP shows that caste has been a major factor. As many as 65 seats have gone to candidates from the so-called forward castes — Rajput (30), Bhumihar (19), Brahmin (13) and Kayastha (3). 

The Yadavs with 22 candidates, the EBC-Vaishya with 20 and EBCs with 13 lead the rest. Mahadalits and Adivasi nominees together account for 12 tickets and the Paswans 10. The remaining candidates are Kushwaha (6), Kurmi (4) and Muslim (2). more

BJP depending on Mind Game

Arun Srivastava / Mainstream
Modi’s gamble ought to be not seen as a mere effort to ensure the defeat of his enemy, Nitish. That would be a simplistic analysis. Modi is not such a naïve person to stake his prestige for simply installing a puppet as the Chief Minister. His decision to put at stake his prestige has the blessings of the Sangh Parivar. True enough, the RSS leadership is aware of the importance of the Bihar elections.
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Though the war of attrition between pari-vartan and swabhiman, governance and jungle raj have been making much noise at the ground level, the fact remains that Nitish has not succeeded in arousing the sense of self-respect and self-assertion among the Biharis. Though some academics close to Nitish for obvious reasons have been playing with the word ‘Bihari subnationality’, the fact remains that ‘Bihari’ has never been a unifying word. more

Wrest, assured

Vijaya Pushkarna / The Week
Nitish was Bihar’s original development man, a son of the soil, and the lone person who dared to take on Modi. Also, Bihar is the first state that is going to the polls after the BJP was humbled—nay humiliated—in Delhi. With just three out of 70 assembly seats in the BJP’s kitty, the joke in the capital was that its elected leaders needed no more than an auto-rickshaw to reach the Delhi Vidhan Sabha. The BJP may not say so, but Bihar has become the battleground for Modi’s swabhiman as much as Nitish’s.
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Bihar could be a game changer for Modi. If the BJP loses, it could have an impact on the party’s chances when elections are held in Punjab in 2016 and Uttar Pradesh in 2017. More action would follow in 2018 when elections to the assemblies of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, all BJP-ruled states with different levels of anti-incumbency, would be held. BJP president Amit Shah, who has the reputation of being a strategist, is closely monitoring the developments and has his trusted people from all over the country in Bihar right now. Any upset here would put a question mark on his skills. It could also spoil the BJP’s chances of winning a second term for Modi.

While Narendra Modi has been unsparing in his criticism of Nitish Kumar, the latter's responses have been short, though not sweet. One such retort was: “The PM comes from a manufacturing state, lots of it could be data. So, he is manufacturing data.” Brevity, after all, is the soul of wit. more

Woo Yadavs, drop MLAs facing anti-incumbency

Kumar Uttam / HT
The BJP has fielded about two dozen candidates from the politically-crucial Yadav community and dropped nearly a fourth of its legislators for the Bihar assembly polls kicking off next month. This is a big upsurge compared to the 2010 election when just six of the party’s 102 nominees were from this backward community that constitutes less than 15% of the state’s population but wields considerable political clout.

The move assumes significance as the grand alliance of chief minister Nitish Kumar’s JD(U), the RJD and Congress is attempting to stitch together a Muslim-Yadav combination, over 30% of Bihar’s electorate, to bring to a halt the BJP’s election juggernaut that has won state after state since the 2014 parliamentary polls win. more

Vote-splitters of Bihar

Rajesh Ramachandran / ET
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has not announced a chief ministerial candidate yet. There is just one focal point of leadership and that is Modi. Then, it is quite natural that all the twists and turns on the battlefront get attributed to the prime mover.

So, when something as strange as five spoilers emerge on the electoral horizon of Bihar, that too gets credited to Modi's genius. Whether it is so or not, all the five spoilers are expected to help the BJP against the RJD-JD(U) combine. more

बिहार: वामपंथ की जड़ पर भगवा रंग

बेगसूराय और खासतौर पर जिले के बीहट गांव को बिहार का लेनिनग्राद कहा जाता था। आज भी इस गांव में
आपको वैसे घर मिल जाएंगे जहां आपको लेनिन की तस्वीर लगी मिलेगी। आज के दौर में बीहट भारत में वामपंथी आंदोलन और इसकी असफलता का एक चिन्ह बन गया है। more

Pappu is in wilderness

Abhinandan Mishra / SG
Madhepura MP Pappu Yadav, who floated the Jan Kranti Adhikar Morcha after his expulsion from the RJD, has no takers in Bihar politics. The NDA refused to accommodate him as it considered him to be the face of Lalu Yadav's jungle raj and thus a liability. Most BJP state leaders also felt that he is now at the last leg of his political journey and the influence that he used to wield in the state in the 1990s and early 2000s has waned. more

BJP, MIM in secret deal to split vote?

Animesh SIngh / Asian Age
Despite All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi vehemently denying rumours that the BJP has propped him up to contest the Bihar elections in four key Muslim-dominated Seemanchal districts, he is learnt to have met Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week, which appeared to indicate that the NDA alliance hopes to divide Muslim votes in the state. more

'Lav-Kush' unity on test in Bihar polls

Abdul Qadir / ToI
Apart from the much publicised MY combination, 'Lav-Kush' brotherhood representing -- the two predominantly agrarian intermediary castes known for their efficient land use, commercial cropping and vegetable growing skills -- hold crucial importance in the electoral politics of the state. Unlike MY, the Lav-Kush factor is a less discussed aspect of Bihar politics, feel observers of the Bihar political scene. more

How BJP Allies Are Busting Its Dynasty Politics Stand

Alok Pandey / ndtv
Over the last two years, the BJP has been among the loudest detractors of 'dynasty politics' - a status that could now be put at risk by its alliances ahead of the Bihar elections.

"Dynastic politics is a termite that eats away the foundation of democracy," Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said last year ahead of elections in Jammu and Kashmir.

But in Bihar this year, the two allies of the BJP are hitting a different note. more

This is a history-making election year for Bihar

Gopalkrishna Gandhi / HT

This is a Bihar year.

• The state of Bihar itself came into existence 80 years ago this year, by a provision of the Government of India Act, 1935.
• India became a Republic 65 years ago, in 1950, with a great Indian, born to Bihari parents, Rajendra Prasad, becoming our first President.
• Forty years ago, in 1975, a brave and noble son of Bihar, Jayaprakash Narayan, was taken into custody under the National Emergency of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
• And 25 years ago this year, in 1990, Lal Krishna Advani’s rath yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya was stopped in Samastipur, Bihar, by the then chief minister Lalu Prasad.
• Eighty, 65, 40, 25 make landmark anniversary years. Such anniversaries are called ‘musical’ or ‘chiming’ anniversaries. Together they make 2015 an important year, an anniversary-filled year, for the state and the people of Bihar.

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If the victory in Bihar is of political choices the Bihar of Rajendra Prasad, Srikrishna Sinha and Jayaprakash Narayan would have won, with another ‘chiming’ anniversary entering future history. more

RJD still strong, despite fall in vote share

Mayank Mishra & Sahil Makkar / BS
Lalu Prasad's Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) contesting the Bihar assembly elections in alliance with once arch-rival Janata Dal (United), remains a formidable force in Bihar despite erosion in his social base all these years.
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Data on elections in the state since 1990 suggests Prasad might have lost some of his appeal among other groups but his core support group of Yadavs and Muslims has remained loyal all through. In 13 elections since 1990 in the state, the RJD emerged the single largest party in terms of vote share on 10 occasions. Only in the last three elections (Lok Sabha in 2009 and 2014 and assembly in 2010) did the party lose that position. 

In all assembly elections since 1990, on the other hand, the combined vote share of the RJD and its allies has consistently been in the range of 25-33 per cent. And in last year's Lok Sabha elections, the combined vote share of RJD and its allies touched the 30 per cent mark yet again. In the eastern regions of the state, the RJD and its allies secured more votes than the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and managed to win seven of the 14 Lok Sabha seats. These regions are dominated by Yadavs and Muslims. more

Relatives get pref in Manjhi's HAM

Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) declared the names of 13 candidates for Bihar polls with majority of them going to big leaders of the party and their family members.

Announcing the names of 13 candidates, HAM president Jitan Ram Manjhi said he would contest from his old seat Makhdumpur (reserved) in Jehanabad district. Manjhi's son Santosh Kumar would be the party candidate from Kutumba (reserved seat) in Aurangabad district. His another son Devendra Kumar was expected to contest from Masaurhi (reserved seat) in Patna district. more

A Realist Takes On An Illusionist

Arun Sinha / Outlook
The two horses of the BJP campaign chariot are Modi the illusion and Laloo the nightmare. First of all, the nightmare was Laloo’s past. Voters do forgive political leaders for their crimes. They forgave Indira the Emergency; they forgave Modi the riots. Both Indira and Modi learnt a lesson. Indira decided not to repeat her crime. Modi has not repeated his until now. Why are we assuming that Laloo has not learnt a lesson? 
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The nightmare is running with the assumption that if the alliance is elected, Laloo will end up controlling the administration, giving a free rein to criminal elements. This assumption ignores the centrality of Nitish. It ignores the fact that Laloo is no more the Laloo of the past. 
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The BJP’s answer to Nitish’s development credentials is the Modi illusion. There is no one in the state BJP who can match Nitish’s credentials in the people’s eye. So it is that Modi has stepped in. 
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Nitish is banking almost entirely on his image as a doer. And all things—successes and failures, pluses and min­uses—considered, Nitish remains the best bet to continue the development story of Bihar. The Battle of Bihar is a battle between an illusionist and a performer. Let’s see who the people prefer. more

Paswan's brother and nephew in the the list of 12

The Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) released its first list of candidates for the Bihar Assembly elections. Among others, the list also features the names of LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan’s brother and nephew. One of the candidates, Md Yousuf Khan, is the son of LJP MP Mehboob Ali Kaiser. more

Hardik threatens to 'spoil game' in Bihar

Alleging that BJP has chosen to maintain a stoic silence over atrocities on Patels, quota stir leader Hardik Patel threatened to "spoil the game" of all in poll-bound Bihar by holding four rallies next month in the state.

"We will spoil the game of all. We will not forgive those who killed our youths. Not one BJP leader has uttered a single word over atrocities on the Patel community. We will hold four grand rallies in Bihar next month," Hardik said. more

Bihar’s great leap forward

Nitish Kumar / Chief Minister of Bihar in ToI
Driven by the ideal of ‘development with justice’, my government has focussed on ensuring governance, rule of law and effective delivery of basic services. Bihar has outperformed the country on most socioeconomic indicators, at 17.99%, decadal GSDP (gross state domestic product) growth rate has been at an all-time high.

Per capita income has grown, so has agricultural, industry and service sector GSDP. There has been a fourfold increase in power supply. More than 36,000 of our 40,000 villages are now almost completely electrified. Bihar’s road network has doubled over the past decade. The state has achieved enrollment ratios of 99% in schools and immunisation rates of up to 60%.
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I feel the time is now opportune to trigger new interventions that will usher in the next level of development in Bihar. ‘Nitish Nishchay – Viksit Bihar ke 7 Sutra’ will create better opportunities for youth of the state and secure their future, further empower our women, and build social infrastructure to provide universal access to basic amenities for each and every citizen of the state. more

Village of IITians struggles with a new equation

Muzamil Jaleel / IE
Patwa Toli is no ordinary Bihar neighbourhood. While the din of looms is a sign of good business, the children here have been weaving a dream, too, every year: cracking the entrance exams for top engineering colleges, including IITs. Prem Narayan Patwa, who heads this weaving community of 1,400 households, says they have sent 180 students to IITs; 30 families from here now live in the US. “One family has seven IITians. If you count all our boys and girls in engineering colleges, the number will be 800,’’ he says. 

Today, the chatter at the looms and street corners is all about the elections. Residents say they have traditionally supported the BJP but this time, they are not quite sure. more

BJP survey says NDA to get majority

Various opinion polls might be throwing up several projections but NDA's own assessment says that it will sail through in the Bihar elections with comfortable majority. While the BJP's exercise to gauge the mood of individual constituencies has been going on for the past couple of months, the latest assessment says that the NDA will bag roughly 160 to 170 seats. According to highly placed sources, the BJP believes that it will get somewhere between 123 to 130 seats. more

Mulayam, NCP form third front for Bihar polls

The Samajwadi Party (SP) on Thursday joined hands with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and two other outfits and announced the formation of a 'Third Front' for the Bihar assembly elections.

Party general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav announced the alliance and said that other than the SP and NCP, former Lok Sabha speaker PA Sangma's National People's Party and Samajwadi Janata Dal (Secular) would also be the constituents of the front. The SJD (Secular) was formed by Devendra Prasad Yadav, who parted ways with Hindustani Awam Morcha of former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi. more

Bizarre election coverage

What exactly is Dainik Bhaskar upto? Its web edition on Sept 15 announced that pegged to the Bihar elections it was starting a flashback series on glimpses of Bihar's historical events. So the first episode has a headline which says "Muslim sashak ne lagwai thi  Nalanda mein aag, hazaron ki karai thi hatya." more

New parties, new alliances

Hindu Editorial
That the Bharatiya Janata Party is willing to go to great lengths to accommodate prospective allies in Bihar is an indication of the intensity of the contest in the coming Assembly election. more

No CM face, but no dearth of aspirants

Binod Dubey / HT
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has decided not to project a chief ministerial candidate for the Bihar assembly polls because of fears of a caste backlash but its list of potential leaders for the post has kept growing. more

Bihar polls: Oil companies refrain from hiking prices

Ahead of Bihar assembly elections, state-owned oil companies have apparently decided not to increase fuel prices, though factors governing the oil market "necessitated" a hike in petrol prices by Rs 1 per litre and in case of diesel, by Rs 2.28 a litre.

IOC, BPCL, and HPCL revise petrol and diesel prices every fortnight based on global crude oil prices and rupee movements. But the companies opted not to revise oil prices on 15 September.

"There will be no change in retail price this week," said an official at one of the three retailers, without citing any reason. Had the companies announced a hike in fuel prices, it would have been the first increase in the last four months. more

Bihar DNA samples await signal from PMO

Anubhuti Vishnoi / ET
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's DNA attack on Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has given his mail man a headache. There's a "spike" in post from Bihar in the past week — all letters with DNA samples.

The Nirman Bhavan Post Office, which handles all post addressed to the PMO, has received 117 big mail bags with about 1,000 letters each. These mail bags with over 1 lakh samples — largely hair strands and nail clippings — are now PMO property, which has not given any directions to the Department of Posts on what to do with more such letters that are expected to stream in. more

How Owaisi's presence will help the BJP

ET Edit
The real threat posed by Owaisi is not that he will split Bihar’s Muslim votes, but that his anti-Hindu polemic might create a backlash among the majority, sending them to the arms of the BJP, champion of political Hindutva. Owaisi has little or no chance of winning even a single seat out of the 243 up for grabs in Bihar, but his incendiary presence can poison the pre-poll atmosphere in the state to the BJP’s benefit, even if we discount dire predictions of communal riots dogging his footsteps. more

Will Bihar swing Modi's way?

Bijoy Sankar Saikia / ET
Assembly election is typically a state event in Indian democracy, but given the political permutations and combinations at the Centre and the challenge that the Modi government faces in mustering the numbers to not just reign but also rule, the Bihar outcome will hold much significance for the broader economy and the financial markets.

A BJP win can help catapult some key and urgent reforms to restore shrinking investor confidence, even though the outcome may not bring about any material change in the country's economic landscape in the immediate term. more

The fall and fall of Congress in Bihar

Mammen Matthew / HT
The party, which gave Bihar 20 of its 23 chief ministers spanning 34 terms since the first assembly in 1951, finds itself completely marginalised, bereft of imagination and innovation to make a comeback and increasingly tugging at the coat-tails of one party or the other to keep itself going. more

Why SuMo is not the CM candidate?

Jyoti Malhotra / dailyO
There is only one chosen one, only one real claimant to the BJP’s candidacy for chief ministership in the big battle for Bihar and that is the mild-mannered and former deputy chief minister Sushil Modi, a lifelong member of the RSS who also maintains strong lines with Delhi’s BJP leadership. Unfortunately, his caste doesn’t quite cut it. In a state where kinship and lineage are significant determinants of your success in politics, Sushil Modi’s Bania caste makes him a bit of an outlier.
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The truth is that the BJP is keenly aware that if they announce Modi’s name as its chief ministerial candidate today, they will have a mini-revolt on their hands, from all the aforementioned leaders of Bihar and others. Each one of these fancies himself as the next occupant of 1, Anne Marg in Patna. Worse, Bihar’s caste-obsessed polity may tend to vote differently if confronted with Sushil Modi’s candidature. more

Results will decide whether Manjhi was the best bet

Amitabh Srivastava / dailyO
The BJP appears to have done well to forge a tie-up with Manjhi given his perceived popularity among the mahadalits but the Gaya-born leader needs to live up to the expectations in the coming polls. As a matter of fact, Manjhi’s track record does not indicate that he has ever been a mass leader of the Dalits and the mahadalits in Bihar. He was a lesser known political entity even during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections when he was fielded by the JD-U from the Gaya (reserved) constituency.

Manjhi’s only claim to fame was that he had served as a minister in the three different governments under Dr Jagannath Mishra, Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar. He was primarily seen all these years as an unassuming man with least political ambitions. In fact, he was said to be contemplating retirement from active politics after his defeat in the 2014 general elections. more

Congress in Bihar polls: target RSS, not seats

Sheela Bhatt / IE
In Bihar, Congress is, apparently, not concentrating on electoral politics. It aims to strengthen the secular plank against BJP. It wants to echo Bihar’s secular victory, if it happens, to pan-Indian voters. As, the former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi has loaned his mahadalit candidates to fight on BJP’s lotus symbol, some of Nitish Kumar’s supporters too will be accommodated by the Congress. The Congress general secretary C.P. Joshi, party in-charge of Bihar, is in the unenviable position of keeping the focus on the larger secular fight than on his party’s battle to win seats. more

Caste-ing Ashoka in Bihar

Nalin Mehta / ToI
What does an ancient emperor who died over 2,300 years ago have to do with the hurly-burly of Bihar elections in the present day? Everything, it seems, as politicians pull out all the stops to attract, make and remake caste formations. So in this cauldron of caste, Emperor Ashoka  has now been repackaged as a Kushwaha leader.

The Rashtravadi Kushwaha Parishad, which is aligned with BJP, has held several commemoration functions in Bihar since last year, arguing that both Chandragupta Maurya and Ashoka were Kushwahas and therefore ancestors of present-day Bihari Kushwahas or Koeris who make up about 9% of voters. more

Bihar polls will reshape India’s political landscape

Minhaz Merchant / DailyO
If the JD(U)-RJD-Congress "grand alliance" wins Bihar, it will establish Nitish as the pivot in a potent anti-Modi national coalition. More parties and leaders will coalesce around him to mount a challenge to Modi in the 2019 Lok Sabha election. The Congress, though a bit player in Bihar, will get new wind in its sails. Sonia and Rahul Gandhi will be emboldened to continue their aggressive disruption of parliament. Modi's sheen of invincibility will dim. Murmurs of internal dissent could grow. The battles for West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh in 2016 and 2017 will become harder to win. more

Bihar poll aspirants ride Nepal airwaves

Sagar Suraj / HT

The Bihar assembly elections have brought unexpected windfall to FM stations in Nepal. Poll aspirants were keeping business rolling inside radio stations with doors closed tight and windows blackened because of curfew in the Madhesi areas of Nepal. The wannabes represent the entire political spectrum.

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The Nepalese FM channels are favoured because they come cheap, offer a wide range of choice and cover more than 100 constituencies. What’s more, the Election Commission has not been able to charge the self-promoting “advertisers” with any excess poll-related expenditure. “We cannot take action because of the absence of guidelines on dealing with foreign radios,” the poll official in Motihari said. more

From Bajrangi Bhaijaan to Battlefield Bihar

Radhika Bordia / ndtv
He is a man who, not long ago, was organising the sets for blockbuster Hindi film hit Bajrangi Bhaijaan and managing events for the likes of the Ambanis. Today, Mukesh Sahni is the emerging face of Bihar's caste-dominated politics. He calls himself the "son of Mallah or boatman", and has pledged to consolidate the backward Nishads into a force that cannot be ignored by any political party. more

Bihar's Shifting Alliances

Alok Pandey / ndtv
This time, Nitish Kumar and the BJP face off as chief rivals, Lalu Yadav plays ally to Mr Kumar's JD(U) and Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party is part of NDA. Till last year, Lalu Yadav was one of Nitish Kumar's most bitter rivals.

The man who has not really changed sides is Jitan Ram Manjhi. He was a BJP ally in 2010 as part of the JD(U) and is a BJP ally now, after JD(U) dumped him earlier this year because he refused to vacate the chief minister's post for Nitish Kumar. Mr Manjhi now heads a new party -- the Hindustan Awam Manch (Secular). more

The battle for Bihar

Anil Padmanabhan / Mint
The emerging narrative has three broad themes: the packaging of development and caste; the gripping duel between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and incumbent chief minister Nitish Kumar; and the polarization along caste and communal lines.

Development is not new to the electoral politics of Bihar. It was actually introduced by Kumar, when he sought to displace Lalu Prasad.
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While development is indeed the icing on the cake, it is a fact that in Bihar, managing the caste math is still critical to winning elections—it is the proverbial base of the cake. While Prasad is looking to consolidate the Yadav and Muslim votes to give the Janata Party alliance the edge, the BJP is seeking to neutralize this by going after the Mahadalit vote and the Most Backward Caste (MBC) votes. more

BJP finalises seat sharing for Bihar

The NDA finalised its seat sharing for Bihar polls with BJP getting to contest 160 out of 243 assembly constituencies, while allies LJP and Jitan Ram Manjhi’s HAM have been alloted 40 and 20 seats respectively. more

Why is Modi not seen as an OBC leader?

Ajaz Ashraf / Scroll
Modi’s persona has three principal elements – development, Hindutva, and OBC status. His strategy has been to remain silent on the Hindutva issues which the Sangh periodically raises, and focus his rhetoric on development. But his idea of development doesn’t include overcoming the inherent inequality of the caste system, which determines unequal access to, and gains from, growth. This is why the OBC facet of his persona can’t be said to represent social justice. It is, in reality, an electoral card the BJP and Modi play deftly to cobble together a majority. 
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The BJP’s allusion to Modi’s OBC status minus the idea of social justice suits the interests of the upper castes, which hope to snatch the lever from Kumar and Yadav to make theirs after a gap of 25 years. For, to talk of social justice, long projected as being synonymous with caste politics, would risk alienating sections of the upper caste. Yet references to Modi’s OBC status, subtly or brazenly, could deter numerous OBC castes from consolidating behind the Janata Parivar. more

Beyond Political Rhetoric, Why Bihar Matters

Shankkar Aiyar / nIE
The polls matter because Bihar matters. The polls matter because Bihar shows why demography is not destiny, because the state of Bihar spells why the feel-good thesis of demographic dividend could easily turn into a demographic disaster. The polls matter because Bihar symbolises the potential of a spectre that must haunt those attempting to re-write the future.

Admittedly, Bihar must wrestle with the burden of history—it was also robbed of the chance of being an industrialised state after resource-rich regions were carved into Jharkhand. Historic politicisation of the state apparatus exacerbated deprivation and poverty. more

Nitish-Lalu’s soft secularism to contain Hindutva

Vinod Sharma / HT
A salient feature of Nitish’s campaign would be soft secularism. Or call it soft Hindutva if you like. The purpose is to prevent communal polarisation that suits the saffron side.

All stakeholders in the three-party combine are one in that thinking, claimed an insider. Barring pro forma references to the BJP’s past, restraint would be visible in even the speeches of Lalu, the Yadav chieftain who earned a national profile by stopping LK Advani’s Ram Rath in 1990. more

Guns, gangs and Bihar polls

Shantanu Nandan Sharma / ET
With most of the known bahubalis behind bars, will the forthcoming elections in Bihar be free and fair? Not really. Sample this: till a month ago, about 24,000 criminals in the state were at large despite non-bailable warrants being slapped against them. According to the data available with the Election Commission, nearly 5,000 of the criminals have been apprehended and put in jail in the last one month, but some 19,000 are still on the loose.
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The ruling JD (U) leaders, however, allege that problems may not come so much from the so-called bahubalis or other petty criminals but from the BJP-RSS' well-crafted design to foment communal passion, so as to polarise the society and gain electoral dividends. more

Shiv Sena to contest Bihar polls

In what could severely dent the NDA's prospects in Bihar Assembly polls, Shiv Sena, which is an ally of the BJP at the Centre and Maharashtra, has decided to contest the upcoming polls. Sources told India Today that the party will be fielding its candidates on 50 seats. What is more worrying for the NDA is that Shiv Sena is planning to give tickets leaders who were rejected by the BJP-led alliance. more

MIM Decides to Contest Bihar Polls

The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen would contest from four districts of Seemanchal region in the State. MIM will focus its campaign on a demand to achieve separate regional development council for Seemanchal under Article 371 of Indian Constitution.

The party also announced the name of two-time-Bihar MLA Aktarul Iman, who hails from Seemanchal, as its Bihar State President. 

Out of the total 243 seats in the State Assembly, MIM would be contesting from 24 or less seats. more

SP's real "humiliation" has been at the hustings

Charu Kartikeya / Catch
Given this track record, its clear that SP's real humiliation has been at the hustings. Then why did it take umbrage at being offered 5 seats by the JD(U), RJD and Congress? Five seats seems a respectable figure as it's more than the number of seats the SP has ever won in Bihar.
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The SP's leader, called 'Netaji' by his shrinking band of followers, seems to have shown all the traits of a petty politician, buckling before whoever controls the CBI. more

Compromise, blandishment: the BJP’s play for Bihar

Neelabh Mishra / Outlook
The BJP has shown a surge in Bihar hitherto never seen before. It utilised its long coalition with Nitish to push the saffron agenda, with events like the Ganga Aarti in Patna and the Mahaviri akhara and attempts to saffronise the smaller OBC and Dalit communities, which had felt excluded from the Mandalite sea-change brought about in the 1990s. The RSS-BJP provided a rallying point to voice their aspirations and invoked imagined or perceived insults to exploit their pride and sense of deprivation. It was through such efforts that the BJP expanded its presence in Bihar. more

EBCs are the wild card

Neerja Chowdhury / ToI
This election, EBCs are the wild card. Will they be more comfortable in the company of BJP’s Bhumihars or equally militant Yadavs in the ‘gathbandhan’, as they increasingly look for their place under the sun? This will determine the outcome of the Battle for Bihar. more

Delay in VYAPAM probe for Bihar Polls?

Rishika Baruah / Quint
Whistleblowers Paras Saklecha and Ajay Dubey have alleged that the CBI is being asked to drag its feet on the issue in order to safeguard the image of the BJP ahead of the Bihar polls.

"Modi says there is jungle-raj in the state of Bihar but what about Shivraj’s VYAPAM in MP? Why is the PM silent? The CBI is being asked to delay the probe so that the BJP does not lose face ahead of the Bihar polls". more

वोटकटवा सबका खेल बिगाड़ेंगे

Mukesh Kumar Singh / ABP News
बिहार में एनडीए ख़ेमा बवंडर में फँसा है. प्रतिद्वन्दियों की सेना सज चुकी है. लेकिन अमित शाह और नरेन्द्र मोदी अपने ‘दोस्तों की होशियारी’ से उबर नहीं पा रहे हैं. दोस्तों के कुनबे में एक ‘महारथी’ जीतन राम माँझी भी हैं, जिनकी ‘संदिग्ध वफ़ादारी’ ने बेचैनी बढ़ा रखी है. माँझी ख़ुद को ‘किंग मेकर’ समझ रहे हैं. दूसरे ‘किंग मेकर’ हैं पप्पू यादव. दोनों का अतीत ‘दुधारी तलवार’ और ‘किसी का सगा नहीं होने’ जैसा रहा है. 8 नवम्बर को यदि स्पष्ट जनादेश नहीं आया तो ये दोनों ही किस रास्ते जाने के लिए उतावले हो जाएँगे, इसका पता तो आज ख़ुद इन्हें भी नहीं होगा. more

Lalu is already part of govt, so where’s jungle raj?

Inaugurating the IBN Dialogue Bihar 2.0 event in Patna earlier on Friday, Nitish directly addressed fears and perceptions that his partnership with Lalu would see a return to lawlessness.

“Where is jungle raj? My government is in the minority. The Congress and RJD are already supporting us. Can you tell me of one instance of lawlessness in the last six months? Where is the jungle raj they are talking about,” asked Nitish taking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, without naming him for spreading fear. more

Delay in seat-sharing: BJP’s deliberate strategy?

Abhishek Chaudhary / Newslaundry
A puzzling question at the moment is why the BJP hasn’t declared seat-sharing arrangements with the NDA partners — Ram Vilas Paswan-led Lok Janshakti Party, Jitan Ram Manjhi-led Hindustani Awam Morcha, and Upendra Kushwaha-led Rashtriya Lok Samata Party -– even after the Election Commission has declared the dates. 

This might be BJP’s deliberate strategy. A delay in seat distribution would give the junior partners less time to form alternate coalitions and hence lesser bargaining power. more

BJP victory: Kushwaha agrees to Amit Shah's verdict

Even before the battle for Bihar has begun, there has been a significant retreat. For the last two months, Rashtriya Lok Samata Party leader Upendra Kushwaha has been adamant that his party should be given the opportunity to contest 67 of the state’s 243 assembly seats. On Thursday, Kushwaha backed down.

In a letter to Amit Shah, Kushwaha said, “We have full faith in the leadership of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi and Shri Amit Shah. We are confident that based on the ground reality in Bihar all the four allies of NDA would be allotted justifiable number of seats.”

The letter was written after the BJP threatened to drop the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party from the National Democratic Alliance if he did not agree to saffron party’s terms, BJP officials said. more

NDA's CM candidate - the problem of plenty

Shashank Shantanu / IT
Recently, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said, "Our parliamentary board will decide whether to project anyone as chief ministerial candidate or not." The statement is proof that the party is afraid to declare a CM candidate and is likely to go ahead with party chief Amit Shah's formula of announcing it after the results come in.

But why is the BJP shying away from announcing a chief ministerial candidate? It's a problem of plenty for the party. Here are the contenders: more

Wavelessness makes Bihar polls more interesting

Abdul Qadir / ToI
There is near unanimity among the observers of the Bihar political scene that the wave that was easily discernible in the 2014 Parliamentary election was missing. 

The last time Bihar witnessed a waveless election was in the year 2000 when the electorate threw a hung assembly in which Nitish Kumar, then as leader of the BJP-JD(U) combine had a week long stint in office. more

Advani, Joshi and Shatru missing from the list

Veteran BJP leaders Lal Krishna Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi as well as Bollywood actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha are missing from a list of star campaigners for the BJP-led NDA ahead of the Bihar assembly polls.

"In the first list of 40 star campaigners prepared by the BJP, the names of Advani, Joshi and (party MP) Shatrughan Sinha are missing," a BJP leader said.

This will be first time when the names of the trio are missing from the list of BJP star campaigners for either assembly or Lok Sabha polls in Bihar. more

Polls show Modi in tough battle to win Bihar

Opinion polls show Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces a close election battle in the country's third-most populous state, Bihar, where defeat would dent his chances of consolidating power and speeding up economic recovery.

A survey by pollsters Cicero released late on Thursday showed Modi-led Bharatiya Jananta Party (BJP) winning a narrow majority in the elections in one of the country's poorest states. The vote will be in five phases from October 12 to November 5.

The BJP's lead was within the poll's margin of error, making the forecast a technical tie. A separate poll by C-Voter this week said the BJP faced defeat. more

The road to 1 Anne Marg

Pranav Gupta , Rahul Verma / IE
Our analysis based on the 2014 Lok Sabha vote share shows that the NDA alliance had an advantage over the grand alliance in 73 seats, lagged behind in 72 seats, and was neck-to-neck in 98 seats. Further analysis of these 98 seats suggests that while the NDA led the grand alliance with a margin of more than 10 percentage points in 17 of these seats, the grand alliance had a similar lead over the NDA in 22 seats. These 39 seats can be considered as safe seats. The road to 1, Anne Marg, the Bihar chief minister’s official residence, will pass through the remaining 59 seats concentrated in two regions — Magadh and Tirhut. more

Survey Shows BJP-led Alliance Losing in Bihar

The RJD, Janata Dal-U and Congress alliance in Bihar is expected to win 116 to 132 seats out of the total 243 seats in the assembly elections, a pre-poll said.

The BJP-led combine, including Lok Janshakti Party and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party, is projected to capture 94 to 110 seats, India TV-CVoter poll showed.

The projections are based on a methodology based on random stratified sample of 10,638 interviews covering all 243 segments in Bihar during the last week of August and the first week of September. more

For Voter Development Is Top Priority

Issues of development, rather than 'jungle raaj' or crime, play strongest on the minds of those planning to cast their votes in the forthcoming Bihar polls later this year. However don't expect the sweeping victories that were seen in Delhi and J&K. The results of a HuffPost-CVoter survey suggest that most of the dissatisfaction among those looking to vote is directed towards their immediate political representative, again an indicator of anger against the quality of roads, schools, colleges, electricity supply and inflation, rather than the Chief Minister or state government. more

Bihar polls from Oct 12, counting on November 8

Assembly elections in Bihar will be fought in five phases between 12 October and 5 November, and counting of votes will be held on 8 November, just three days before Diwali.

Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi said polls to the 243-seat Assembly will be held on October 12, 16, 28, November 1 and 5. more

BJP will be the pre-eminent force: Yogendra Yadav

Sagarika Ghose / ToI
Pollster turned politician Yogendra Yadav puts on his psephologists hat and tells that he believes the BJP will be the pre-eminent force in Bihar. He also says Nitish Kumar is now a tragic figure. 
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No matter who forms the government, BJP will emerge as the pre-eminent political force in Bihar. This is a major shift from what Bihar used to be. Remember, BJP used to be the number 3 or number 4 party in Bihar. We cannot be sure of the outcome, that's a guessing game. But the manner in which the game is being played is BJP vs the rest, all major political formations coming up against the BJP. What this does, is it makes the BJP the number 1 political force in Bihar. more

Surge of female MLAs: progress or delusion?

Bhanupriya Rao & Saumya Tewari / BS
Bihar may still be one of India’s most backward states, but when it comes to female political representation, it is among the country’s best.

The state of 104 million people has 34 female MLAs (next only to Uttar Pradesh’s 35), one of the highest in the history of female representation in India’s state assemblies and the highest-ever in the state’s history. By proportion, 14% of Bihar’s state assembly is female, second only to Haryana (14.4%). more

Theme songs are adding colour to the poll battle

Abhishek Jha / Scroll
As any perceptive political analyst at any tea shop in Bihar will tell you, the noise of print and digital campaigning is nothing but a sideshow before the state assembly elections later this year. The real battle is taking place somewhere else – in caste alliances, vote consolidation, door-to-door campaigning, and party meetings at various levels.

Still, the proliferation of political hoardings and posters at street corners beg the question: what purpose do they serve? Is it to sway the undecided voters, that is, if there are any in the caste-driven politics of Bihar? Or is it to be seen and heard at many places at the same time? more

10 'X-Factors' That Could Decide Battle Bihar

Yashvant Deshmukh, Manu Sharma / HuffPo
Bihar is no stranger to the centre-stage of Indian polity. From the halcyon days of the Independence struggle to the seething era of the JP movement to ultimately the Mandal times, Bihar remained a harbinger of political fortunes for leaders of India. The landslide 2014 victory (31 out of 40 seats) for the Narendra Modi-led NDA cemented the reputation of Bihar as a kingmaker state of India.
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While it is premature to predict the direction in which the political winds will blow, it is worthwhile to delineate the 'X' factors that will go into the making of Bihar Verdict 2015.
X-Factor 1: The majority equation of the minorities more

CM candidate : BJP engineers guessing game

Abdul Qadir / ToI
Senior BJP leader and home minister Rajnath Singh's statement that the BJP will soon take a call on whether to project someone as the CM candidate or not in the coming Bihar elections has started a guessing game fuelling speculations that it may not be very wise to put PM Modi's popularity directly on test in Bihar, of the all places. But the Delhi experiment continues to haunt the BJP feel observers.
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According to Ali Hussain, a political science teacher, non projection of the CM face may cut both ways and and as such it is difficult to say that it will follow the same trajectory as it did in Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Haryana. Whereas in Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Haryana, BJP's rivals too did not declare their chief ministerial candidate, in Bihar, the rival alliance has already declared Nitish Kumar as the CM candidate, said the Political Science teacher. Moreover, in Bihar BJP finds itself in the league of untested allies and the alliance leaders are known for their acrobatic skills and opportunistic conduct. more

Six Left parties join hands for Bihar polls

Six major Left parties have joined hands to contest the forthcoming Bihar Assembly elections and vowed to fight the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and chief minister Nitish Kumar-led JD(U)-RJD-Congress grand alliance.
CPI(ML) general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya said "We have been waiting for this moment for years. We were asked whey can't the Left parties unite. Today we have come together to make the saffron brigade of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and grand alliance of RJD-JD(U)-Congress bite dust in the Bihar Assembly polls." more

Contradictions of the Lalu-Nitish alliance

Jeffrey Witsoe / ToI
Over the past few months, Bihar has been covered with hoardings featuring a smiling Nitish Kumar, often displayed right next to those of Narendra Modi, creating the image that the election is essentially a contest between these two "men of development". But it was Lalu Yadav who addressed the rally last with an impassioned speech, invoking the caste-based rhetoric of the Mandal period that defined his reign in Bihar. How to square Nitish Kumar's "sushasan" with Lalu's "Mandal bomb" remains the defining question of an alliance fraught with contradictions. more

बिहार में चुनावी मुद्दा... बदला, बदला और बदला

मनीष कुमार / एनडीटीवी

आखिर वह कौन सा मुद्दा है जिसने बिहार के चुनावी इतिहास में ऐसा व्‍यक्तिगत और हाई प्रोफाइल, हाई टेक प्रचार अभियान नहीं देखा। आखिर ये कौन सा मुद्दा है कि प्रधानमंत्री नरेन्द्र मोदी चुनावों के पूर्व बिहार में पांच चुनावी सभा कर डालते हैं, उनकी पूरी कैबिनेट बिहार के हर सुदूर कोने की परिक्रमा कर चुकी है। चुनाव की घोषणा से पूर्व 150 से ज्यादा प्रचार रथ बिहार के हर गांव का दौरा कर चुके हैं। ये आखिर कौन सा मुद्दा है कि नीतीश कुमार सोशल मीडिया में फेसबुक से ट्विटर तक प्रचार और अपने विरोधियों खासकर प्रधानमंत्री नरेन्द्र मोदी पर हमले करने का मौका नहीं छोड़ते। आखिर ये कौन सा ऐसा मुद्दा है कि नीतीश कुमार, लालू यादव और कांग्रेस नेताओं के घर जाते हैं और अपने समर्थकों के तमाम विरोध के बावजूद उन्हें मनमानी सीट भी देते हैं।

दरअसल इस बिहार विधानसभा चुनाव का एक ही मुद्दा है बदला, बदला और हिसाब-किताब चुकाने वाला बदला। more