RJD hopes to win back Muslims
The RJD leaders are hopeful that the Muslim support will come back to the party in this year’s Bihar Assembly election, after party chief Lalu Prasad Yadav was declared the chief ministerial candidate of the Rashtriya Janata Dal-Lok Janshakti Party combine.
The RJD is hopeful that the Muslims would give the party their votes in place of the Congress, as they did in the last year’s Lok Sabha elections.
Though there is an apparent disenchantment in the RJD ranks for giving the position of deputy chief minister to Pashupati Kumar Paras of the LJP in place of a Muslim, the party leaders maintain that Mr Yadav would be able to mollify the minority voters.
“The Muslims had largely voted for the Congress in the 2009 Lok Sabha election but now that the RJD-LJP combine is contesting the polls under Mr Yadav the minority voters would make a choice in our favour by recognising that our combine is the principal opponent of the JD (U)-BJP alliance,” stated a senior RJD functionary.
The RJD leaders concede that the Muslims had not been voting in favour of the party since the 2005 Assembly elections and even in certain areas the JD(U) had managed to get their votes. However, the RJD leaders maintain that the results of the recent byelections in the state have given hope to the party that the Muslim voters are having a second thought.
“Despite Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar making the byelections a prestige issue, the ruling JD(U)-BJP combine had faired miserably, which gives hope to the RJD-LJP alliance. Now that Mr Yadav will himself be pitted against Mr Kumar, the contest will be more equal than that of the 2005 elections,” added the functionary.
The RJD leaders are pinning their hope more on the fact that Mr Yadav would be able to rediscover his earlier magic, when he ruled the state with his MY (Muslim-Yadav) combination.
“The Bihar chief minister is attempting to divide the Muslims on the caste lines. Mr Yadav will tell them what he had done for them when he was the chief minister of the state,” stated the RJD functionary.
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