JD(U) TO CONTINUE WITH NDA ALLIANCE FOR THE 2019 LS POLLS
NEW DELHI: JD(U) will continue to be a part of the NDA alliance for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the party announced during the national executive meeting held on Sunday in Delhi.
JD(U) leaders sought to play down reports of strain in its ties with the BJP over allotment of seats among the NDA parties for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and asserted that the ruling alliance will fight the election together and sweep it.
“It will be decided later as to which party will contest how many seats. The NDA will fight the elections together and sweep the state (Bihar),” its General Secretary Sanjay Kumar Jha told reporters.
Party leaders said the issue of number of seats did not come up for discussion and that Kumar has been authorized to finalize its stand.
Today’s meeting, held in Delhi’s Bihar Bhawan, was attended by all the senior leaders of the party.
The party’s national executive at its meeting, attended by its top leaders including Kumar, also favoured simultaneous polls, a proposal being backed strongly by the Modi government.
It, however, called for evolving a consensus through talks with other parties, sources said.
In the meeting, JD(U) leaders also agreed to acknowledge and abide by any decision taken by the party president.
“In the light of 2019 election, all the power has been given to the National President (Nitish Kumar) to take political decisions. It was also decided how will we go about in the upcoming election,” said JD(U) general secretary Sanjay Jha.
The executive also reiterated the party’s opposition to the Citizenship Amendment Bill that allows Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan to be eligible for Indian citizenship after a stay of six years. Religion cannot be a basis for citizenship, it said.
The BJP had won 22 of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in 2014 and its allies, Ram Vilas Paswan-led LJP and Upendra Kushwaha-led RLSP had six and three respectively. The JD(U) had won only two seats.
JD(U) leaders have argued that their party had performed much better than the BJP in 2015 assembly polls and its results should be considered in the allotment of seats for the Lok Sabha election.