Even as seat-sharing discussions in both the NDA and Mahagathbandhan camps for next month’s Bihar Assembly polls reach their final stages, both sides will keep a close watch on 52 of the state’s 243 constituencies that were decided by less than 5,000 votes in 2020.
The election five years ago was closely contested, with the RJD emerging as the single-largest party with 75 seats and the BJP finishing second with 74. The NDA overall came out on top with 125 constituencies, while the Mahagathbandhan finished with 110.
An analysis of the last Assembly elections reveals that 15 of these closely contested seats were won by the Lalu Prasad-led Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), while the Congress bagged nine. The other Mahagathbandhan partners — CPI, CPI(M) and CPI(ML) Liberation — won a seat each. The RJD finished as the runner-up in 16 of these seats, while the Congress, CPI(ML) L and CPI came second in seven, two, and one seat, respectively.
On the NDA side, the Nitish Kumar-led JD(U) won 13 of the 52 seats and the BJP nine. The Mukesh Sahani-led Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), which contested the 2020 polls as part of the NDA and is now with the Opposition, and Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustan Awam Morcha (Secular) won a seat each. The JD(U) finished second in 13 of the 52 seats, while the BJP and VIP came second in 10 and two seats, respectively. The then undivided Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), which went solo in the polls, won its lone seat of Maithini by just 333 votes.
The close contests
The narrowest victory margin was in Hilsa in Nalanda district, which the JD(U) won by 12 votes. The Nitish Kumar-led party won Barbigha in Sheikhpur district by 133 votes. Ramgarh in Hazaribagh district recorded the third-narrowest margin, where the RJD defeated the BSP candidate by 189 votes.
In the SC-reserved seat of Bhorey in Gopalganj district, the JD(U) candidate defeated the CPI(ML) L nominee by 462 votes, while in Dehri in Rohtas district, the BJP candidate lost to the RJD nominee by 464 votes. In Bachhwara (Begusarai district), the BJP defeated the CPI candidate by just 484 votes. In Chakai (Jamui district), an Independent edged out the RJD nominee by 581 votes, while the BJP lost to the RJD and the CPI in Kurhani (Muzaffarpur) and Bakhri (Begusarai) by 712 and 777 votes, respectively. The Parbatta seat (Khagaria) saw the JD(U) candidate defeat the RJD nominee by 951 votes.
In what will bring cheer to the NDA, it managed to regain ground in last year’s Lok Sabha elections. In 20 of the 52 low-margin seats that the Mahagathbandhan won last time around, the ruling alliance took a lead in the parliamentary polls. The Opposition alliance was ahead in six constituencies that the NDA had won in 2020.
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Among the seats where fortunes changed are the Darbhanga Rural Assembly segment, part of the Darbhanga Lok Sabha constituency, where the RJD edged past the JD(U) by 2,141 votes in 2020. But, in the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP led the RJD by 24,075 votes. In the Maharajganj segment of the Maharajganj Lok Sabha seat, the Congress defeated the JD(U) in 2020 by 1,976 votes, but trailed the BJP by 20,738 votes last year.
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