Prashant Kishor-led Jan Suraaj on Sunday claimed that the NDA alliance diverted Rs 14,000 crore funds from World Bank for the Bihar assembly elections.
In an interview with ANI, spokesperson Pavan Verma accused the central government of pulling funds meant for another project from the World Bank and distributing it to women voters under the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana in the poll-bound state.
He noted that Rs 10,000 had been credited to the accounts of 1.25 crore women in Bihar, but claimed that the timing and the source of the money raised doubts.
“The public debt in Bihar is at present 4,06,000 crores. The interest per day is 63 crores. The treasury is empty,” he remarked, before adding that the party had heard, though he said it could be inaccurate that the Rs 10,000 transfer “was given from Rs 21,000 crores, which came from the World Bank for some other project,” he told ANI.
He also claimed that “an hour before the moral code of conduct in October for the polls, Rs 14,000 crores were taken out and distributed to 1.25 crore women in the state.”
Verma also mentioned rumours circulating among voters: “There are 4 crore women voters in Bihar, and 2.5 crores have not received the amount. The remaining women felt that if the NDA does not come to power, then we will not receive the benefit.”
The Jan Suraaj leader argued that the sudden financial distribution overshadowed the messaging of his party. He said, “Our ambitions of being a new party were excessive, but our message was right and the response was good.”
Asked whether schemes like the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana changed the electoral equation, he pointed to earlier comments by the Prime Minister. “PM Modi has himself criticised giving freebies. Maybe he had said it in the context of the Delhi Assembly and former Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal. Now what happened in Bihar?” he asked.
He also refuted the claims that the performance of the party in assembly polls could be due to the founder Prashant Kishore's promise to lift the liquor ban in Bihar if voted to power.
His party colleague, Uday Singh, also levelled similar allegations.
"Since June, till polls were announced, Rs 40,000 crore was splurged" by the Nitish Kumar government to "purchase" votes of the people through public money, Singh said.
"The scale was unprecedented. Even Rs 14,000 crore of the loan they received from the World Bank has been diverted for doles and freebies," he alleged.
The NDA won 202 seats in the 243-member assembly, with the BJP securing 89, the JDU 85, Union minister Chirag Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) 19, Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha five, and Rajya Sabha MP Upendra Kushwaha's Rashtriya Lok Morcha four.
The RJD-led Opposition bloc, Mahagathbandhan, could only manage 35 seats. While the RJD got just 25 seats, its second-worst performance in a Bihar election after 2010, the Congress won six seats, down from 19, the CPI(ML) two seats, the CPM one, and the CPI zero.
Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM won five seats.
Bihar voted in two phases November 6 and November 11 and recorded a voter turnout of over 66 per cent, the highest ever in the state since 1951.
