UPA inches towards Bihar pact

Although they claimed that they had reached a seat-sharing agreement for the Bihar Assembly elections, United Progressive Alliance (UPA) leaders today deferred the announcement for another day, as Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad left for Patna.

Coalition leaders maintained that deliberations were in the "final stage" and that the talks were held in a "spirit of accommodation" and that they would announce the details about the agreement once the Election Commission notification came.

The notification for the first phase of the four-phase elections will be issued on September 23. "The talks are in the final stages. But you have to wait till the Election Commission notification for details," Prasad told reporters.

The three-hour deliberations at the RJD chief's residence were attended by Ahmed Patel and Digvijay Singh (Congress general secretaries); Sitaram Yechury, CPI(M) politburo member; and Tariq Anwar, general secretary of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).

Prasad lost no time in attacking his bete-noire and LJP chief Ramvilas Paswan, who formed a third front, saying the latter's intention was to install a "BJP-brand Janata Dal (United) leader" Nitish Kumar as chief minister of the state.

But when asked about this, Digvijay Singh said they were willing to accommodate Paswan and were "waiting". The four UPA allies held their first round of talks yesterday.

Similar is the situation in the third front, which consists, among others, the Ramvilas Paswan-led LJP and the CPI. Paswan, who held talks with CPI National Secretary D Raja as also leaders of the RSP and the Forward Bloc, spoke in a similar vein.

Sources said in the RJD-led alliance, Lalu Prasad's party would have the lion's share of about 190 seats while the Congress share was expected to be in the range of 30-40 and the NCP and the CPI(M) around eight each. The strength of Bihar Assembly is 243.

Digvijay Singh and Bihar Congress unit chief Sadanand Singh parried questions on the exact number of seats that the party would be contesting with Digvijay making it clear that the Congress emphasis was not on number of seats but winnability of candidates.

Bihar will be having Assembly polls for the second time in ten months this year as the earlier elections threw up a hung House and subsequent developments resulted in the dissolution of the Assembly.