The ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM)-Congress combine in Jharkhand declared their seat-sharing agreement for the upcoming Assembly elections Saturday, with Chief Minister Hemant Soren saying that the INDIA bloc will fight the polls together and that the JMM and the Congress will contest 70 of the state’s total 81 seats.
CM Soren indicated that the remaining 11 seats have been left for the INDIA bloc’s other allies such as the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Left. He, however, did not divulge the details of the seats being contested by various INDIA partners.
The seat-sharing announcementmade by the leaders of the JMM and the Congress at a joint press conference in Ranchi, however upset the RJD, which called it “unilateral”.
The announcement was made after a flurry of meetings between JMM executive president and CM Soren and his party leaders with the Congress and RJD leaders including ex-Bihar deputy CM Tejashwi Yadav.
Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren with former Bihar deputy CM Tejashwi Yadav. (PTI)
At the press conference, Soren was flanked by the AICC in-charge of Jharkhand Ghulam Ahmad Mir, state minister Rameshwar Oraon and ex-Pradesh Congress Committee chief Rajesh Thakur from the Congress side besides the JMM’s general secretary Vinod Pandey, spokesperson Tanun Khatri and Giridih MLA Sudivya Kumar from his party.
“We have built a consensus and decided that JMM and Congress will fight in 70 seats. The remaining ones we can’t divulge now because some of our allies need to be present here in Jharkhand. We will give you a detailed response later, ” said Soren.
He said the JMM-led alliance was confident of returning to power in the state on the back of its development work.
Congress sources said the JMM may fight from about 43 seats with around 27 seats to be contested by the grand old party.
However, soon after the announcement, rifts surfaced in the INDIA camp. RJD MP Manoj Jha openly expressed his party’s disappointment. “I have to painfully say that a unilateral decision was taken that RJD will contest from x number of seats. This is not in accordance with either RJD’s strength nor in accordance with the current situation. We have our strengths in different districts and we will request our coalition partners to decide accordingly.”
Jha added that “We had a meeting this morning and we identified 15-18 seats where we are capable of defeating the BJP alone.”
The RJD also made it clear that “all options were open” to the party.
Sources in the JMM brushed aside the RJD’s objections, saying that it was their “pressure tactic” and that “based on their strengths the RJD has been given the details”.
In the 2019 Jharkhand polls, the JMM-led alliance bagged 47 seats, with the JMM winning 30 seats, Congress 16, and RJD 1. The BJP had won 25 seats, JVM-P 3, AJSU Party 2, CPI-ML 1, NCP 1 and Independents 2.
The INDIA bloc’s announcement came a day after the BJP-led NDA declared its seat-sharing agreement, as per which the BJP will contest 68 seats, AJSU Party 10, JD(U) 2 and LJP (Ram Vilas) 1.
The Assembly polls will be held in two phases on November 13 and 20, following which the counting will take place on November 23.
The filing of nomination papers for the 43 constituencies, which are going to polls in the first phase, began on Friday and will continue till October 25.
In the 2019 polls, the JMM contested in 43 of the 81 seats and won 30. The Congress won 16 of the 31 seats where it had fielded candidates. The JMM had a better strike rate. The RJD contested seven seats and won one seat. This time, the CPI(ML), a constituent of the INDIA bloc, is also keen to be part of the alliance.
The JMM and the Congress have been seeking more seats this time. The Congress was asking for 33 seats pointing out that two MLAs — one from the BJP and another from Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (Prajatantrik) – had joined the party. Unlike in Maharashtrathe JMM-Congress combine has to battle a perception of anti-incumbency in Jharkhand.
In the Lok Sabha elections, the NDA had a lead in 49 of the 81 Assembly segments in Jharkhand. The BJP alone led in 46 segments. The JMM led in 14 Assembly segments and the Congress in 15, putting the INDIA bloc’s total at 29. The Independents led in two other Assembly segments and the BSP in one. What gives the JMM-Congress combine hope is the fact that the BJP has suffered some losses in the Lok Sabha elections with its tally coming down from 11 to 8. Of the 14 Lok Sabha seats, the BJP-AJSU combine won 9, down three from 2019, and the JMM-Congress alliance 5, up three from 2019.
