Bihar polls: Samajwadi Party to not contest in upcoming Assembly election, to support RJD

Patna, Sep 22: In what comes as a major development, Samajwadi Party (SP) has announced that it will not contest the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections but would support the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). The SP made the announcement through its official Twitter handle.

In a tweet, the party said, "In the forthcoming Bihar Assembly elections, Samajwadi Party will not enter into any alliance in Bihar and will support RJD's candidates."

Meanwhile, SP MLC Udaiveer Singh said, "Yes, the party has decided this and made an announcement."

A senior party functionary has said there are two primary reasons behind not contesting the Bihar polls -- one is that the party does not want to weaken like-minded parties and secondly, the SP does not have a strong base in Bihar.

"We will support RJD will all our might and ensure the defeat of the BJP coalition," the functionary added.

In 2015, the SP had pulled out of a grand alliance of RJD, JDU, and Congress after it was offered only five seats. It later joined hands with NCP but both the parties could not win any seats.