NDA wrests Bihar, ends Lalu's 15-year reign

Nitish Kumar took it all. In an unambiguous verdict, the people of Bihar sent the Janata Dal(United)-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance to Patna's Vidhan Sabha with 142 seats, beyond the alliance's wildest expectations and much more than 123, the magic number needed for a simple majority in the 243-member Assembly.

Kumar will take oath as chief minister on Thursday. Rabri Devi, former chief minister and wife of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad, won her Raghopur seat, but with only a 4,500 vote margin. Barely five months ago, her majority had been 17,000 votes.

It indicates that the people had made up their minds to bring Kumar to power without any ifs and buts.

Though the Lalu-Rabri reign ended in the March elections, today's verdict put the final seal of approval ensuring the transfer of power to Kumar, who like Lalu is a product of Jayaprakash Narayan movement of the 1970s.

Calling the verdict a vote for change against "misrule and injustice", Kumar said good governance would be his top most priority and would be fair to all religious communities and castes, including the extremely backward classes and deprived sections.

Prasad accepted the defeat of his party early in the day, and said he owed Kumar no ill will. He did, however, warn of dangers Kumar's other ally, the BJP, represented. Prasad also said the Lok Janashakti Party (LJP) leader Ramvilas Paswan was a non-factor in the election.

The LJP contested 231 seats and won just 11, a third of what it had won in the February round. The independents also numbered just 10, whereas in the last elections they had got 22 per cent of the popular vote.

The defeat triggered a blame-game in the secular camp with the Congress and the CPI(M) suggesting that Paswan's decision to plough a lonely furrow split the anti-BJP votes.

Paswan, however, maintained that had his suggestion for making a Muslim a chief minister and the RJD-Congress combine supported it the results would have been different. Like the other UPA leaders, he said the Bihar results would have been different.

The BJP, which managed to establish its presence in a major Hindi heartland state, was understandably ecstatic. This represents a crucial victory for the saffron party and party leader waved away talk of a difference of opinion with the JD(U). "There is absolutely no contradiction between the BJP and the JD(U). We fought the elections on a common agenda and will proceed further with ease," BJP General Secretary Arun Jaitley said.

Jaitley attributed the poor showing of the RJD-led Secular Democratic Front to its "unconstitutional" behaviour after the February polls that threw up a hung House.

"The results have proved that people of Bihar want governance, rule of law and development. You just can't fool people all the time," Jaitley added.

Denial of a chance to the JD(U) to form the government in February had been a blessing because that government would have fallen under the pressure of the mafia leaders the LJP had brought to the Assembly, he added.

This result had proved what everyone suspected: that Lalu performs better in a three or four-cornered contest, he said. "We fought with one front. Their front had three or four sections, all working at corss purposes," he said.

While it was clear that Prasad's Yadav following stood by him, his Muslim supporters chose to distance themselves from the election altogether. This contributed in part of his defeat.

In terms of regions, while he did well in Mithilanchal, Magadh turned the thumbs down on the RJD. There is no evidence that the most backward classes (so called Annexure 1 castes) voted for the RJD, despite a frenzied public campaign through newspaper advertisements, reminding them of all that the RJD had done for them.