New Delhi--The ruling JD(U) in Bihar has urged Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav to project party leader and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar as the Janata Parivar’s candidate for the top post in the assembly elections, to be held later this year, said sources.
Both JD(U) president Sharad Yadav as well as Nitish himself met Mulayam — who is expected to head the Janata Parivar after the formal merger of six regional parties — to put forth their request. While Sharad had met Mulayam on Friday, Nitish, who could not attend the meeting as he was recuperating after an eye surgery, met him on Saturday.
Both leaders told Mulayam that given the current atmosphere of the state, the Janata Parivar was at an advantage there, said sources. Nitish’s clean image, good track record and personal stature gave him a clear edge over leaders from the rival camp, they are believed to have told the SP chief.
If the Janata Parivar closed its ranks behind Nitish, its victory was a foregone conclusion, the chief minister and Sharad told Mulayam, said sources. The JD(U) leaders pointed out that neither Lalu, who had been convicted in the fodder scam, nor his wife Rabri Devi, who has suffered electoral setbacks, could be projected for the top job, said sources.
But the RJD, headed by Nitish’s former political adversary Lalu Prasad Yadav, may not agree with the JD(U). The party does not want a chief ministerial candidate to be named right now and feels that a final decision on the issue should be taken only after the election results are declared, said sources in the RJD.
The party also feels that electoral performances of the Janata Parivar parties in the 2010 assembly election — when the JD(U)-BJP alliance won a decisive mandate in the state — cannot be the basis of distributing seats between them for the forthcoming polls because political alignments have undergone a sea-change since then, said sources. The RJD wants a fair and realistic distribution of seats and more clarity on the issue, but Nitish has been non-committal so far, said sources in the Janata Parivar.
Indian Express
