- Nitish Kumar's JDU released its first list of 57 candidates for Bihar elections
- Five current ministers retained seats in JDU's initial candidate list
- JDU and BJP will each contest 101 seats in Bihar's 243-member Assembly
A day after its ally BJP, the Nitish Kumar-led JDU has released its first list of 57 candidates for the upcoming Bihar election. Five ministers in the current government have retained their seats. Three strongmen, including Anant Kumar Singh, also feature in the JDU's first list. Four women candidates are on the first list.
The five ministers who made it to the first list are Rural Development Minister Shravan Kumar, who will contest from Nalanda, Water Resources Minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary (Sarairanjan), Information and Public Relations Minister Maheshwar Hazari (Kalyanpur), Social Welfare Minister Madan Sahni (Bahadurpur) and Prohibition Minister Ratnesh Sada from Sonbarsa.
JDU and BJP are contesting 101 seats each in the election to the 243-member Bihar Assembly. The remaining seats are divided between Chirag Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas), Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha and Upendra Kushwaha's Rashtriya Lok Morcha. Chirag Paswan, who scored a 5/5 in the Lok Sabha election last year, has bargained hard this time. In the 2020 polls, he went solo, harming the NDA candidates in several constituencies.
At least five seats on which the JDU has declared candidates were expected to go into Chirag Paswan's kitty as part of the seat-sharing. According to insiders, this had upset Nitish Kumar and he stressed that these seats must stay with his party. The five seats eyed by both parties include Morwa, Sonbarsa, Rajgir, Gaighat and Matihani. JDU has announced candidates for all these seats today. In the 2020 polls, RJD won in Morwa and Gaighat, and JDU in Rajgir and Sonbarsa. In Matihani, Lok Janshakti Party's Rajkumar Singh emerged victorious, but he later switched to the JDU.
The four women candidates on the first list include Kavita Saha from Madhepura, Komal Singh from Gaighat, Ashwamedh Devi from Samastipur and Raveena Kushwaha from Vibhutipur.
Out of the 57 candidates in the first list, 30 are new names and 27 have been repeated.
Polling for the Bihar election will be held on November 6 and 11. Results will be out on November 14.
