Bihar poll: Fears of horse-trading
With the Rajya Sabha polls for Bihar’s five vacant seats set to be held on Thursday with six candidates in the fray, there is anxiety among both the parties and the candidates amid an atmosphere of possible horse trading. Money could play a decisive role despite the major parties either having issued whips or deciding to stay out.
Ever since the surprise entry of Uday B. Garudachar, a Karnataka industrialist and owner of Bengaluru’s popular Garuda Mall, as the sixth and only Independent candidate last week, the five party-based candidates have been holding parleys with leaders of smaller parties and even meeting MLAs of their own parties by visiting their village homes. Still, with the Assembly polls just four months away, there are anxieties that several MLAs could defy their parties’ official decisions on voting without much thought about losing their Assembly memberships. The five party-based candidates are three of the ruling NDA — the JD(U)’s Upendra Kushwaha and Ram Chandra Prasad Singh, and the BJP’s Rajiv Pratap Rudy — and two of the RJD-LJP combine — LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan and former RJD MP Ram Kripal Yadav. In the emerging scenario in the 243-member Assembly, Yadav, a Lalu loyalist, could be in trouble as he is the RJD-LJP’s second nominee.
On Wednesday, the 10-MLA Congress announced decision to stay away from the polls. With three Congress MLAs having proposed the candidature of Mr Garudachar in the face of confusion in the party, sources said “a good number of Congress MLAs” could vote for the Independent candidate. Mr Garudachar is also likely to get the votes of the five BSP legislators, sources said. The NDA and the RJD-LJP issued whips on Thursday, saying they would allot quota to their MLAs to vote in accordance with the allotted quota. The CPI(ML), which has five MLAs, decided to stay out.
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