In Bihar, RJD to contest on 21 seats, Cong gets 11

New Delhi: Congress will contest from 11 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar while the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) will fight from 21 seats in the state during the forthcoming general elections. This was finalised after talks between both the parties on seat sharing ended on Wednesday evening. There are 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar.

Former NDA ally Upendra Kushwaha, who has now joined the UPA fold, is likely to get four seats while former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustan Awam Morcha (HAM) may contest from three seats, with the Begusarai seat is likely to go to the Communist Party of India (CPI) candidate and former JNU student leader Kanhaiya Kumar, sources aware of developments, said.

The negotiations between the Mahagathbandhan partners, which had been going on since Tuesday, were held at Congress general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal’s residence in the national capital with RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav present in the meeting.

While the Congress was keen to contest around 15 seats, the RJD was firm that it could not give it more than 11 seats. Sources privy to developments said that while on Tuesday the seat sharing negotiations had got stuck as the Congress was adamant on 15 seats, on Wednesday it finally accepted RJD’s offer of contesting from 11 seats.

In 2014, the Congress had contested from 12 seats in Bihar, but could manage to win only one seat, while the RJD had contested all the 40 seats and managed to bag only four seats, amid a strong Narendra Modi wave.

Though the number of seats for all the Mahagathbandhan allies in Bihar have more or less been finalised, former JD(U) chief Sharad Yadav, who has floated his own outfit Loktantrik Janata Dal (LJD), is keen to contest the Madhepura seat under his own banner.

Sources said that RJD is learnt to have offered him the aforementioned seat, provided he contests under their banner, but the veteran leader is not keen on that offer. Clarity on this deadlock is expected soon, sources added.