BJP will sweep remaining 3 phases of polls: Jaitley

Senior BJP leader and finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Saturday his party will get a clear majority in the Bihar assembly elections and form a government in the state on its own.

Claiming that the BJP had wrested advantage after the first two phases of elections, Union minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday asserted the party would sweep the next three rounds of polls.

Arun Jaitley also attacked the Grand Alliance, saying Nitish Kumar’s JD-U, which earlier fought against corrupt parties, was now forced to stand with them because of opportunism. (Sonu Mehta/HT Photo)

Jaitley claimed that the BJP would get a clear majority on its own and the National Democratic Alliance would obtain an absolute majority.

He told the media that in the days to come, the NDA would intensify its campaign with as many as 17 rallies to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“We will not leave even a single stone unturned to win the polls,” he added.

The JD(U)’s major weakness, Jaitley said, was that it failed to bring stability in the government and its developmental model was “primitive”.

The party could not exploit its huge human resource and failed to create employment opportunities, he added.

Hitting out at the Grand Alliance, the Union finance minister said it was an “unnatural” coalition and was formed with the sole objective of achieving power at any cost.

Asked about the cancellation of PM Narendra Modi’s meetings before the second phase of polling in the state, Jaitley said none of the Prime Minister’s programmes were cancelled; rather they were rescheduled.

On the steep rise of prices of ‘arhar dal’, he sought to clarify that there was a global fall in the production of pulses and the problem in Bihar was accentuated owing to the failure of the state government to check the hoarding of the essential commodity.

The senior BJP leader apparently took a swipe at the media, saying elections could not be won with the help of friendly media stories.