Bihar: NDA performs poorly in assembly by-polls, win in Samastipur LS by-poll comes as face-saver

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) member Lok Jan Shakti Party (LJP) won Samastipur Lok Sabha by-poll, but it performed dismally on four of the five assembly seats for which by-elections were held in the state on October 21.

LJP candidate Prince Raj won Samastipur seat by bagging 3.9 lakh votes, 49.48 per cent of the total votes polled. He defeated Congress' Ashok Kumar by a margin of over one lakh votes.

The BJP and its allies faced defeat in the assembly by-polls held in Kishanganj, Simri Bakhtiarpur, Daraundha, and Belhar constituencies.

Qamrul Hoda of the All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen won Kishanganj seat, by beating BJP's Sweety Singh by close to 10 thousand votes. Hoda had polled over 70 thousand votes.

Similarly, in Simri Bakhtiarpur seat, JDU candidate Arun Kumar was defeated by RJD's Zafar Alam by more than 15 thousand votes. On Belhar seat too, RJD's Ramdeo Yadav clinched the seat with a margin of close to 20 thousand votes.

Karnjeet Singh, an Independent candidate, won Daraundha seat by beating JDU's Ajay Kumar Singh with a tall margin of over 27 thousand votes.

The only seat where the NDA ally JDU won was Nathnagar where its candidate Lakshmikant Mandal defeated RJD's Rabiya Khatun by over 5,000 votes.

The NDA's poor performance can be ascertained from the fact that BJP and JDU have managed a combined vote percentage of 32 on the five assembly seats.

LJP leader Chirag Paswan expressed satisfaction with his party's candidate and cousin Prince Raj's win from Samastipur parliamentary by-election.

He, however, added that all the allies will have to discuss the reasons behind the dismal performance in the assembly by-polls.

"This (Prince Raj's) win is very important for our party as well as for the NDA. All of us (NDA parties) will sit down and hold discussions over the poor performance in assembly by-polls," Chirag told reporters here.

"This win is because of the work done by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and LJP chief Ramvilas Paswan's policies. I thank the people for this victory," added Chirag.