LJP may play spoilsport for JD-U in Bihar polls

By Manoj Pathak Patna, Oct 26 : The entry of Lok Janshakti Party as an independent contestant in the Bihar Assembly elections may spoil the party for the ruling Janata Dal-United, an ally of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance.
The JD-U, which was the ‘big brother’ for the NDA in the past, is now faced with the embarassing situation wherein its leader and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s pictures are not even there on BJP advertisements in newspapers ahead of elections, giving rise to a lot of speculations.
Even surveys done by various agencies in Bihar have allegedly revealed that Nitish’s popularity among the voters has gone down.
However, BJP state President Sanjay Jaiswal maintains that the BJP-led NDA is fighting the elections under the leadership of Nitish Kumar only, who is the chief ministerial candidate of the alliance.
On the other hand, JD-U leader Ajay Alok maintains that many ‘yuvraj’ or political heirs were in the fray to save their political careers and the situation will be clear on November 10 when the results are declared.
Irrespective of what NDA allies may say, the situation for the JD-U began to worsen after LJP leader Chirag Paswan moved away from the NDA in Bihar to show his independence by voicing difference of opinions on the implementation of various schemes in Bihar or the working of the state bureaucracy.