Saturday, 11 October 2025
Saturday, 11 October 2025
If Ravi Shastri was the commentator, he would say, “It’s all happening in Bihar.” The political pitch in the poll-bound state is seeing heavy bounce and turn, with movements across the parties.
The ruling JDU on Saturday re-admitted in its team former Jehanabad MP Arun Kumar, who had for some time been a bitter critic of Nitish Kumar and threatened to break the Bihar chief minister’s ribs.
Kumar, 66, was inducted into the party along with several supporters in the presence of JDU working president Sanjay Kumar Jha, Union minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh 'Lalan' and state unit chief Umesh Kushwaha.
"We just saw Arun Kumar and Chandeshwar Chandravanshi share a warm hug. They will bring a storm [tufaan] in the entire Magadh region,” Lalan was quoted as saying.
Chandravanshi had wrested the Jehanabad seat from Kumar in 2019 by a slender margin of about 2,000 votes. Kumar had won the seat in central Bihar for the JDU in 1999. At present the RJD holds the seat.
Kumare, who had vowed to "break the ribs of Nitish Kumar" after quitting the JDU, won the Jehanabad seat again in 2014 on a ticket from the RLSP, a breakaway group headed by Upendra Kushwaha.
Kumar fought with Kushwaha soon afterwards and floated his own outfit, Bharatiya Sab Log Party, which failed to make an impact in 2020 Assembly polls and the Lok Sabha polls last year.
Kumar's re-induction is being seen as an attempt to neutralise the damage that may have been caused by another upper caste Bhumihar leader from Jehanabad, Rahul Sharma, jumping ship.
Sharma, a former JDU MLA from Ghosi, on Friday joined the RJD in the presence of Tejashwi Yadav.
His father, Jagdish Sharma, is a heavyweight of the area who had represented Ghosi a record eight times as an Independent candidate and on tickets from the Janata Party, Congress and BJP. In 2009, he won the Jehanabad Lok Sabha seat for the JDU.
Bihar BJP vows big-ticket Sunday
Bihar BJP chief Dilip Jaiswal on Saturday dismissed speculation about rumblings of discontent among the NDA constituents in Bihar and promised important announcements on Sunday.
"Everything is fine in the NDA,” he said. “Seat-sharing arrangements and the list of candidates will soon be decided by the party's central leadership, which will make important announcements related to seat sharing and tickets at 11am on Sunday.”
NDA constituent RLM chief Upendra Kushwaha said that talks for seat sharing have not yet concluded.
"Don't pay attention to rumours floating around. The talks are not yet concluded. Wait...! I don't know how the news is being circulated in the media. If someone is planting news, it's deceit, it's betrayal," the former Union minister wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi had earlier said that he was "requesting and not making a claim" that his HAM be given a respectable number of seats, otherwise the party might not contest the election.
Another Union minister, Chirag Paswan's LJP (Ram Vilas), which had earlier settled for around 20-22 seats, is now reportedly asking for at least 25 more.
Assembly elections in the state will be held on November 6 and 11, while votes will be counted on November 14.
"I have been helping the NDA for a long time. So, I am requesting the NDA leaders and not making a claim. My party would prefer not to contest the polls, if we don't get a respectable number of seats,” Manjhi had said.
“But I must make it clear that even if we don't contest polls, our party will keep working for the NDA partners in the coming polls," he added.
According to sources in the NDA, the bigger allies the JDU and BJP are likely to contest 102 and 101 seats, respectively.
Senior leaders in the LJP (RV) are of the opinion that the party should get at least 45 seats, said a party leader on the condition of anonymity.
Prashant Kishor warns Tejashwi Yadav
Poll strategist-turned Jan Suraaj Party founder Prashant Kishor on Saturday claimed that RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav would lose his Raghopur Assembly seat in the upcoming Assembly polls, just like Rahul Gandhi had suffered a humiliating defeat in Amethi Lok Sabha constituency in Uttar Pradesh six years ago.
Kishor was tight-lipped on the possibility of entering the fray himself.
"I am going to Raghopur to get feedback from the people of the constituency, which wants an end to the supremacy of one family. Before Tejashwi Yadav, a second-term MLA, his father Lalu Prasad and Rabri Devi had represented that seat. Yet, it is crying for basic amenities," Kishor said.
He said the Jan Suraaj Party’s central election committee meeting is scheduled for Sunday, and the feedback he would receive from Raghopur will also be up for discussion.
"Based on that, the most suitable candidate will be decided. I cannot say whether it is going to be me. The decision has to be taken by the party," Kishor said.
The 47-year-old broke into a grin when journalists pointed out that rumours were afloat that Yadav might contest the upcoming polls from more than one seat.
Kishor said, “At present, there is just a speculation that Jan Suraaj Party will give a strong candidate in Raghopur, and Tejashwi Yadav is so scared. Let him contest from two seats. His fate in Raghopur will be the same as that of Rahul Gandhi in 2019, when the Congress leader fought two seats, but ended up losing his stronghold of Amethi."
Kishor was also asked whether Pawan Singh could have announced the decision not to contest Assembly polls out of “fear”, a day after the Bhojpuri superstar’s estranged wife Jyoti met Kishor.
He replied, “Pawan Singh is not an enemy. He is a personal friend, and it does not matter to me that he is in the BJP. When his wife came to me to share her insecurities, I gave her assurance just like a brother. We are very clear that neither I nor Jan Suraaj Party is going to meddle in their marital dispute”.
Jyoti was understood to have approached Kishor with the request for a ticket, though she denied it when journalists asked her about the same.
Kishor made light of several aspirants voicing dissatisfaction after the party released its first list of 51 candidates a couple of days ago.
"It is natural. Thousands of people have built the Jan Suraaj Party with their blood, tears and sweat. It is never possible to accommodate them all when the assembly has only 243 seats. But we are a democratic party which does not keep its doors shut. Everything will be resolved," he said.
AIMIM to contest 100 seats
The AIMIM, which has been spurned by the INDIA bloc in Bihar, on Saturday said it was planning to contest around 100 seats in the upcoming Assembly polls, five times the number it had fought in the last elections.
The party, headed by Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi, claimed that it was aiming to build a "third alternative" in Bihar, where politics has, for years, been all about the BJP-led NDA and the Congress-RJD combine.
In the last assembly polls, the AIMIM had won five seats and was understood to have damaged the RJD, Congress, and the Left combined in a number of other Assembly segments.
In 2022, four MLAs of the AIMIM joined the RJD.
Owaisi has been accusing the RJD, JDU and the Congress with apathy towards Muslims. He in turn has been accused of being "a B team of the BJP", which cuts into "secular votes" to help the saffron party.
