Patna: The NDA's dominance continues in the Bihar Legislative Council after 11 of its members, including chief minister Nitish Kumar and deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi, were elected unopposed on Thursday.
The nine other MLCs elected include health minister Mangal Pandey and Sanjay Paswan of the BJP, Rameshwar Mahto and Khalid Anwar of the JDU, Rabri Devi, Ram Chandra Purbey and Khurshid Muhammad Mohsin of the RJD, Santosh Kumar Suman a.ka. Santosh Manjhi of HAMS, and Prem Chand Mishra of the Congress.
The JDU remains the strongest party in the 75-member Council with 32 members, including the acting chairman Haroon Rashid. The BJP is at second place with 22, and the RJD third with nine members. Recently, four Congress MLCs joined the JDU after which the grand old party's numbers slid to just three in the Council.
Of the 11 new elected members, Sanjay, Rameshwar, Khalid, Khurshid, Santosh and Prem Chand are debutant MLCs. This is Nitish's third innings at Council. Mahamaya Prasad Sinha, Bhagwat Jha Azad, Satyendra Prasad Sinha, Lalu Prasad and Rabri Devi were also chief ministers while being MLCs.
Except Nitish and Rabri, the nine other new MLCs received their certificates from the Bihar Legislative Assembly secretary-cum-returning officer Ram Shrestha Rai on Thursday. JDU Bihar president and Rajya Sabha member Bashishtha Narayan Singh received the certificate on Nitish's behalf, whereas RJD chief Lalu Prasad's confidant and MLC Bhola Yadav received the certificate on Rabri's behalf.
Going by the numbers, the RJD is about to get the Leader of Opposition's post in the Council for Rabri. The RJD will also get the posts of the chief whip and the deputy chief whip.
Keeping the 2019 elections in mind, all political parties have tried their best to keep their supporting castes intact and that's why just two out of 11 members are from the upper castes: Mangal Pandey and Prem Chand of the BJP and the Congress, respectively.
Both the JDU and the RJD have given one seat each to minorities, and the remaining seven MLCs are from the backward castes. In the new Council, eight members will be from the minority community -six from the JDU and two from the RJD.
