Despite widespread fears about the Maoists’ terror tactics, Bihar’s sixth and final phase of Assembly polls in 26 constituencies recorded an average 51 per cent voter turnout on Saturday.

Taking bouncy steps into what looks like an early celebration mood even before the Assembly polls are over, Bihar’s ruling JD(U) and its ally BJP have busied themselves in dismissing both the RJD-LJP and the Congress as virtual non-entities in the state despite the rigorous campaigns by their top leaders.

Amid palpable fears that the Maoists entrenched in Bihar’s southern districts may unleash violence to disrupt the sixth and last phase of Assembly polls slated for Saturday, the state’s police have taken elaborate security precautions to let polling in the 26 constituencies take place peacefully.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday ripped into the much-hyped claims of development made by Bihar’s NDA government in her impassioned campaign speeches, asserting that the state’s downhill journey was steered in the past 20 years — 15 years of RJD rule and the next five of NDA’s.

Further lowering the levels of decorum in Bihar’s election campaign speeches, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav on Monday likened chief minister and JD(U) stalwart Nitish Kumar to a rat and claimed the RJD-LJP alliance would be forming the state’s next government.

A barrage of immoderate political comments in Bihar over former Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief K.S. Sudarshan’s no-holds-barred personal diatribes against Congress president Sonia Gandhi resurrected old dichotomies and ironies in the state’s politics on Saturday, indicating that the controversy could overshadow the campaigns for the final phase of Assembly polls.

Despite the fear of Maoist violence, the penultimate leg of Bihar’s six-phase Assembly polls were held largely peacefully on Tuesday, registering an average 50 per cent voter turnout in the 35 constituencies considered a stronghold of the ruling JD(U)-BJP alliance.

Amid their relentless claims about forming Bihar’s next government at the expense of the other when the ongoing Assembly polls end, chief minister Nitish Kumar and RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav keenly w

Bihar was jolted by a wave of Maoist violence on Monday — a day before the penultimate phase of Assembly polls for 35 seats — as two policemen were killed while defusing a powerful can bomb planted by

Bihar’s ruling JD(U) and the BJP on Sunday claimed to be reaching “total victory” as the six-phase Assembly polls in the state neared to the end with the last two remaining phases to be held shortly.