The Grand Alliance's sweep of the elections has pulled the proverbial rug from under many a Bihar leader's feet.
On Friday Shakuni Choudhary, the state chief of HAMS, announced retirement from active politics. Choudhary, who has played a long innings in Bihar politics batting for the Congress, the RJD, the JDU and HAMS, lost his Tarapur seat in Munger district for the second consecutive time. His son, Rajesh Kumar, also lost from Khagaria Assembly seat as a HAMS candidate. Choudhary has represented Khagaria in the Lok Sabha.
"I take full responsibility for the defeat of my party and NDA (of which HAMS is a part)," Choudhary said.
Jitan Ram Manjhi, the founder of HAMS, has refused to accept Choudhary's resignation. "But I do not see any revival of Choudhary in the near future," conceded a HAMS leader who didn't want to be named.
Once proclaimed as the leader of the Kushwahas - the second largest block in the OBC - Choudhary could not ensure his community votes for the NDA candidates including himself and his son.
The future of the other Kushwaha leader in the NDA, Union minister Upendra Kushwaha, is also under a cloud. The NDA won only one Assembly seat from Karakat, his Lok Sabha seat.
The RJD-JDU-Congress combine's success has left other heavyweights eating humble pie, such as rebel Madhepura MP Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav.
When the RJD and the JDU united to fight the polls, Pappu rebelled against his RJD. He floated the Jan Adhikar Party (JAP) and contested 101 seats. His supporters believed that Pappu would be the future Yadav leader. The results - the JAP failed to win a single seat - showed that he could not even influence the polls in his strongholds Madhepura, Saharsa and Supaul, home to a sizeable Yadav population.
While campaigning, Pappu had declared that he would quit politics if both of Lalu's sons won their elections. On Thursday, he apologised for the poll-time bluster.
"I regret using such undignified terms," Pappu said, stressing that he had misread the ground support the Grand Alliance enjoyed. For the moment, he has ruled out returning to the Lalu fold. But staging a comeback in politics is going to prove an uphill task.
The political future of the LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan, once considered a state king maker, is also uncertain His younger brother lost from Alauli, his nephew was defeated from Kalyanpur, and his son-in-law lost from Bochaha.
Others who suddenly look in the doldrums are NDA leaders C.P. Thakur, Rajiv Pratap Rudi, Syed Shahnawaz Hussain, Ashwani Choubey and Ram Kripal Yadav.
