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Sharad Pawar spots silver lining in Bihar polls, says it has paved the way
Bihar election results: The grand alliance made some early gains as counting of votes began on Tuesday morning, but soon the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) turned the tables and took lead.
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar said on Tuesday that the election result in Bihar may not have brought change, it has paved way for change in future.
“What I saw during campaign was on one hand there was Narendra Modi, who has been chief minister for many years and also a prime minister into second term, along with an incumbent chief minister Nitish Kumar. On the other side, there was inexperience youngster like Tejaswi Yadav,” Pawar said while speaking with reporters in Pune.
“The way Tejaswi fought elections will offer inspiration to many youngsters. Today’s results may not have brought change, it has paved way for change in future,” he added, suggesting that Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) led grand alliance has lost Bihar Assembly election. RJD leader is the grand alliance’s chief ministerial candidate.
The grand alliance made some early gains as counting of votes began on Tuesday morning, but soon the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) turned the tables and took lead. While the NDA has BJP, Janata Dal (United) and other parties as its constituents, the grand alliance is led by RJD along with Congress and three Left parties.
The BJP is emerging as the big winner in this election, leading in 74 of the 110 seats it contested (according to trends at 6 pm). It has also won three seats, according to Election Commission of India’s (ECI) website.
Its partner JD(U) has is leading in 47 seats; it has won two so far. In 2015, the BJP had won 53 seats and JD(U) 71. But this year, Nitish Kumar’s party is even behind the RJD which is leading on 69 seats.
The counting of votes for the Bihar assembly elections will take longer than usual and continue till late in the night because of 63 per cent increase in the number of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), the Election Commission said, asserting that the pace of counting of votes is not slow.
An official said that the counting has been “glitch-free” so far.
To ensure social distancing norms put in place due to the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic, the ECI had increased the number of polling stations from nearly 65,000 in the 2015 to 1.06 lakh in this election. This meant an increase in the number of EVMs as well.
Deputy Election Commissioner in charge of Bihar, Chandra Bhushan Kumar, said that in the 2015 assembly polls, counting was held in 38 locations. But to ensure distancing norms, this time, counting is being held at 55 locations.
