Patna, 20 Oct

The Congress agreed to contest 61 seats in poll-bound Bihar, nine less than the number of constituencies where it had fought five years ago, but will end up contesting against INDIA bloc partners, like the RJD and the CPI, in several Assembly segments, a leader of the opposition front said on Monday.

Vaishali, Lalganj, Kahalgaon, Rajapakad and Rosera are among the Assembly seats where the Congress and the RJD would end up fighting with each other.

The Congress nominee will also fight against CPI's candidate in Bachwara.

Reacting to the situation, a senior Congress leader, on the condition of anonymity, said, "One can't deny the fact that our top leadership failed to assess the ground situation and gave tickets to several candidates who did not deserve."

He also said, "Take the example of the Barabigha assembly, Congress nominee Gajanand Prasad Sahi lost the assembly polls in 2020 with a margin of less than 200 votes and this time he was not given a ticket."

The Congress leader also claimed that former MLA Amit Kumar Tunna from Riga and Jayesh Mangalam Singh from Bagaha have been given tickets by the party this time, even though they lost the last Assembly polls with a huge margin of more than 25,000 votes.

Earlier in the day, the RJD, the principal Opposition party in Bihar, also released its list of 143 candidates.

The RJD list put paid to rumours that the party was going to contest the Kutumba seat, currently held by state Congress president Rajesh Kumar Ram.

Commenting on the stalemate over the seat-sharing arrangement among INDIA bloc constituents, RJD state unit spokesperson Mrityunjay Tiwary told PTI, "Alliance partners of the INDIA bloc must understand our compulsions. The RJD is the party which contests only in Bihar and neighbouring states. We don't demand seats in southern or other states from our partners. We are the biggest party, we deserve to contest the maximum number of seats in Bihar."

He confirmed that there are "certain seats where the Congress is contesting against RJD and CPI candidates, and the grand old party should withdraw their candidates there".

The 243-member Bihar assembly will go to polls in two phases on 6 and 11 November, and counting of votes will take place on 14 November.

The filing of the nomination papers for the first phase of polls already closed on October 17, while the last date for submitting such documents for the second round will end on Monday.

It may be recalled that veteran Congress leader Tariq Anwar recently expressed his bewilderment over the manner in which candidates were being selected by the party.

"One is unable to see any uniform criterion. Many candidates who had lost in the previous elections by a margin of a few hundred votes have been dropped. On the other hand, some others who were trounced have been considered this time," Anwar, who represents Katihar Lok Sabha seat , had told reporters.