Patna, March 19 – A blame game is underway within the Mahagathbandhan in Bihar, days after four MLAs from the opposition coalition failed to show up for voting in the biennial Rajya Sabha elections, resulting in a victory for the ruling NDA.
Although the 35-MLA multi-party coalition received support from five legislators of the AIMIM and one of the BSP, their candidate, Amarendra Dhari Singh, failed to secure a second consecutive term, and the defeat is being attributed to the absence of three MLAs from the Congress and one from the RJD.
The embarrassed Congress, which has only six MLAs in the state assembly, has issued notices to its absentee MLAs – Manoj Biswas, Surendra Kushwaha, and Manohar Prasad – seeking an explanation for why they did not vote in favor of Singh on March 16.
The notice was issued on Wednesday by Kapil Deo Prasad Yadav, the head of the state Congress disciplinary committee.
Biswas, who spoke to reporters after receiving the notice, defended his decision, stating, "I drafted my response. I did not engage in any indiscipline. I did not cross-vote. The candidate fielded by the RJD was not to my liking. There was no directive from the state leadership to vote in favor of Amarendra Dhari Singh, so I acted according to my conscience. The RJD was not treating my party with respect."
Biswas also claimed that he would have voted for the RJD candidate had they fielded a Muslim candidate, a community with a strong presence in his constituency of Forbesganj.
"Till the last minute, it was being said that the RJD was going to field Hina Shahab. I wonder what changed," said Biswas, referring to the widow of gangster-turned-politician Mohd Shahabuddin, a former MLA from Siwan who has multiple terms, whose son Osama is an MLA from Raghunathpur.
Surendra Kushwaha, who represents the Valmiki Nagar assembly constituency, said he had reservations about "voting for a Bhumihar candidate, when my entire political journey has been focused on OBCs and EBCs and fighting against upper-caste dominance."
CPI(ML) Liberation MLA Sandeep Saurav expressed his disappointment at "our votes being wasted because of the Congress," and advised the alliance partner to "look within to identify and address the rot that seems to have taken root."
"In state after state, the Congress has exposed its vulnerabilities to horse trading. The problem is compounded by the brazenness of the BJP, which is rumored to be using money from the PM Care Fund, which is cleverly exempted from RTI, for such activities," Saurav alleged.
The former JNU Students' Union leader was also critical of the absence of Faisal Rehman, the RJD MLA from Dhaka constituency, who is in Delhi to care for his ailing mother, who underwent surgery.
Saurav said, "This is an unconvincing excuse. Did the MLA have to perform the surgery himself? He could have taken time off to catch a flight, cast his vote, and return immediately. The action to be taken against such MLAs is an internal matter for the concerned parties. But I urge the alliance partners to get their act together."
Independent MP Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, who supports the Congress, was also critical of the party's MLAs' conduct, even as he condemned RJD national working president Tejashwi Yadav, the leader of the opposition in the state assembly, for "running away after the defeat."
"I am surprised by the absentee MLAs' argument that they did not like the Rajya Sabha candidate. Were the legislators liked by all in the party when they were given tickets? And they should not whine about respect. At least they got the Congress ticket. I did not, but I am still supporting the party in its fight against the NDA," said Yadav, whose wife Ranjit Ranjan is a Congress Rajya Sabha MP from Chhattisgarh.
Lashing out at Tejashwi Yadav, who is on vacation at his in-laws' place, the MP said, "It is unbecoming of the leader of the opposition to run away to Kolkata after a setback. A serious incident of police firing took place in Muzaffarpur yesterday. He should have been here."
Meanwhile, JD(U) spokesperson and MLC Neeraj Kumar dared Tejashwi Yadav to take action against the absentee RJD MLA.
"He was barely able to secure the position of the leader of the opposition. Even the slightest setback in his party's tally will result in him losing his seat as LoP," he said.
According to rules, a party must have a number of MLAs that is more than 10 per cent of the total strength of the assembly to claim the post of the leader of the opposition.
The RJD has 25 MLAs in the 243-strong House. However, the rules also stipulate that the government has discretionary powers to grant the leader of the opposition status even if the party concerned falls short of the aforementioned strength. A case in point is RJD's Abdul Bari Siddiqui, who was named the LoP in 2010 when the party had only 22 MLAs.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and BJP national president Nitin Nabin were elected to the Rajya Sabha on March 16 when the ruling NDA made a clean sweep, clinching all five seats in the state to which biennial polls were held.
