The BJP and its alliance partner the JD (U) will be contesting 101 seats each in the upcoming Bihar elections.
Of the remaining 41 seats, its other allies Lok Janashakti Party will be contesting 29 seats and this has been a huge victory for the LJP headed by Union Minister Chirag Paswan.
Apparently, the BJP was very clear about not giving more than 20 seats to the LJP during the negotiations initially but something happened in the interim which turned the tide in favour of the LJP. That incident was the suicide of Dalit IPS officer Puran Kumar.
52-year-old Puran Kumar, an IPS officer from the 2001 batch of Haryana cadre committed suicide at his residence in Chandigarh.
In his suicide note, he had mentioned caste discrimination leading to him taking the extreme step.
Naturally, his death snowballed into a huge political controversy with Rahul Gandhi and other big politicians descending on the IPS officer’s home and using his suicide to target the Modi government and RSS.
The suicide has become a campaign issue for the Mahagatbandhan in Bihar which is seeking maximum mileage from it.
The Lok Janashakti Party was founded by Ram Vilas Paswan, a Dalit and after his passing is now helmed by his son Chirag Paswan.
Naturally, the BJP cannot afford to antagonise the Dalits of their own Party at this critical juncture and the result was that in the seat-sharing talks, LJP walked away with 29 seats.
