BJP picks Chirag Paswan over his uncle
The BJP has chosen Chirag Paswan’s Lok Janshakti (Ram Vilas) Party over his uncle Pashupati Paras’s Rashtriya Lok Janshakti Party, ending days of speculation.
According to sources, the BJP has agreed to concede five seats to Mr. Paswan, including the Hajipur Lok Sabha constituency that his father and Dalit leader Ram Vilas Paswan won eight times. It is currently held by Mr. Paras.
A jubilant Mr. Paswan posted pictures of his meeting with BJP president J.P Nadda on social media. “We have together finalised the seat sharing in Bihar for the ensuing Lok Sabha polls. The same will be announced in due course,” he wrote on X.
The breakthrough came after Mr. Paswan’s public posturing that he was ready to walk out of the alliance if the BJP did not give him a “respectable share”.
Sources said for the past one week, senior BJP leader Mangal Pandey was told to settle the feud between the two LJP factions. But the talks bore no result as Mr. Paswan clearly laid down the condition that he would remain a part of the NDA only if his uncle’s faction was not given any berth.
“We were clear from the beginning that the person who engineered a split in the party founded by Ram Vilasji should not be accommodated in the NDA, either by giving them a Rajya Sabha berth or with seats in the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls,” a senior leader close to Mr. Paswan said.
Sources said the BJP acceded to this demand based on the condition that Mr. Paswan would not press for the 2019 Lok Sabha seatsharing formula.
In 2019, the united LJP under the late Ram Vilas Paswan, was offered six Lok Sabha seats in Bihar and one Rajya Sabha seat. The party won all six seats.