BJP’s RS arithmetic fails in Bihar

Raipur, November 10

Bihar results have severely affected Bharatiya Janata Party’s hopes to consolidate its position in Rajya Sabha. The party was expecting to improve its RS tally by four next year by posting victory in Bihar assembly polls. Had the people given mandate to Narendra Modi, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance would have sent at least ten MPs in RS by 2019.

There are 16 MPs from Bihar in the RS. The Janata Dal’s (United) share is 12 and BJP has four. Next year, JD(U)’s five MPs are completing their tenure on July 7. These MPs are Sharad Yadav, KC Tyagi, Pavan Varma, RP Singh and Gulam Rasool Balyavi.  

Six MPs including two of BJP and four of JD(U) will complete their tenure on April 2, 2018. The two BJP MPs are Ravishankar Prasad and Dharmendra Prasad. Both are union ministers at present. The four MPs from JD(U) are Vashishth Narayan Singh, Anil Sahni, Ali Anwar and Mahendra Prasad.

The tenure of rest five MPs including two of BJP and three of JD(U) will complete in April 2020. The BJP MPs are CP Thakur and RK Sinha while those from JD(U) are Ramnath Thakur, Harivansh and Kahkashan Parveen.

Presently, there are 244 MPs in the RS. One seat from Odisha is vacant. The NDA has 67 seats of which 48 belong to BJP while the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance has 78 MPs. There are 89 MPs who neither belong to NDA nor UPA. Ten MPs are nominated in the House.

The BJP knows significance of majority in the Upper House. The party has posted landslide victory in 2014 general elections, however a slew of its important decisions are pending in the RS because it has insufficient strength. In fact, it was this reason the party has to depend on others for support.

What will be the seat arithmetic now?

Bihar has 243 assembly seats. Next year, five RS seats of its quota will vacate. When polls will be conducted for these five RS seats, there will be approximately 49 voters behind every seat. In this scenario, the Mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance) comprising JD(U), RJD, Congress and small parties will easily win three seats and will also manage to win the fourth one by horse-trading.

In this number game, the BJP can also win one seat which means a new face from saffron regime will reach RS next year. However, when six RS seats from Bihar quota will vacate in 2018, the BJP will have to incur loss of one seat because at that time, its MPs will complete their tenure.