Chirag Paswan, leader of the Lok Janshakti Party Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) presses the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to concede to his demand of giving him six seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and one Rajya Sabha Seat. Before taking a final call to join the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), Chirag met Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
In Bihar, there are 40 Lok Sabha seats and the NDA had won 39 seats, RJD did open its account and the Congress won one seat. BJP won 17 Lok Sabha seats in 2019 elections, while LJP had won 6 and JD (U) had won 16.
Last week, JP Nadda, national President of the BJP had written a letter to Chirag Paswan in which he had extended an invitation to him to attend the NDA meet which is scheduled to take place on July 18, 2023. Speculations are rife in the political circle that Chirag might be offered a berth in the Union Cabinet.
BJP looks forward to cement ties between Pashupati Kumar Paras and Chirag Paswan
In order to avoid division of votes, the BJP is trying to break peace between Rashtriya Lok Janshakti Party (RLSP) leader Pashupati Kumar Paras and Chirag Paswan.
It was in June 2021 that Paras had staged a coup in the erstwhile LJP by removing Chirag Paswan as the president of the party. Five Lok Sabha MPs out of the six sided with Paras. It was then that Paras was offered a ministerial berth in the Union Cabinet. Meanwhile, Paras has clearly stated that he would not leave the Hajipur Lok Sabha seat for nephew Chirag Paswan.
Of late Chirag had said that there was no doubt that his party would contest the Lok Sabha elections from Hajipur.
While speaking to the media persons, Paras said that Chirag had no standing in Hajipur and he had contested elections from Hajipur at a time when Ram Vilas Paswan was alive in 2019.
Paras also added that Chirag had not spoken a single word against Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav. The BJP has been pressing for Yadav’s resignation after the Central Bureau of Investigation filed a case against him in the land for jobs scam.
Union Minister Nityanand Rai tried for a rapprochement between Paras Paswan and Chirag Paswan. However, Paras clearly told him that it is unlikely that the two would patch up.
Chirag had parted ways from NDA in 2020
Ahead of the Bihar Assembly polls that were held in 2020, Chirag Paswan had walked out of the NDA. Chirag had campaigned against Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal United (JDU) during the Bihar assembly polls. At that point of time JDU was the key partner of the BJP.
