Defeating NDA in Bihar more important than seat-sharing: Tejashwi Yadav

Patna, Mar 13: RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav after on Wednesday claimed that there was no confusion among alliance partners, adding more than who gets which seat, defeating NDA in Bihar was most important.

"All the leaders of the 'mahagathbandhan' today came here for a meeting, we discussed seat sharing. There isn't any confusion between us, we are all clear," ANI quoted Yadav as saying.

Top leaders of the 'mahagathbandhan' met in the national capital to thrash out the contentious issue of seat-sharing for 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar.

The Mahagathbandhan comprising of RJD, Congress, Hindustani Awam Morcha, Rashtriya Lok Samta party, Vikas Sheel Insan party and other left parties have not even reached a seat-sharing agreement.

According to the reports RJD president Lalu Prasad is not in favour of giving more than 11-12 seats to Congress, which is demanding minimum 15 out of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar to contest.

Senior party leader Sadanand Singh on Tuesday said the party was willing to contest Lok Sabha elections under the umbrella of Mahagathbandhan only if it gets a respectable number of seats to fight.

"The state unit has already conveyed it to the party top leadership that we must get a respectable number of seats to fight elections. If RJD and Congress fail to reach a respectable consensus, then the top leadership is open to the option of going alone in the state just like Uttar Pradesh" said Sadanand Singh, senior Congress leader.

RJD, which is the largest party in the mahagathbandhan, will be contesting 20 of the 40 Lok Sabha in Bihar seats and leave the rest for the other alliance partners. Kushwaha had recently severed ties with the NDA after failing to crack a deal with the BJP and was left with zero seats in the JDU-BJP pact. He has now joined the mahagathbandhan, where he is likely to get six seats.

BJP, JDU and LJP have already announced the seat-sharing formula for the Lok Sabha elections with BJP and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JDU contesting 17 seats each and leaving six seats for Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan's LJP.