NDA may send Ram Vilas Paswan to Rajya Sabha as per seat sharing deal

New Delhi, Nov 2: Alliance in Bihar may be announced any time with the Janata Dal (United) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) reaching to an agreement of contesting equal number of seats in 2019 Lok Sabha elections. It was more or less agreed upon by these two political parties that Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) will be given six seats while Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) two seats.

Sources said that neither the LJP nor the RLSP is agreeing to anything less than what had they contested in the last elections. This is the reason that RLSP leader is not only meeting leaders from other political parties in Bihar but making statements that have more than one meaning. The LJP leadership has clearly told the BJP leadership that it is not ready for anything less than seven seats. Now, the BJP leadership and Janata Dal (U) are thinking in terms of sending LJP president Ram Vilas Paswan to Rajya Sabha from Bihar. Ram Vilas Paswan is also not very keen on contesting Lok Sabha elections due to his deteriorating health conditions.

Sources in the LJP confirmed that the National Democratic Alliance may move in this direction and LJP may agree on six Lok Sabha seats and one Rajya Sabha seat but RLSP leader Upendra Kushwaha will have to agree on two seats. So the likely situation will emerge like this BJP and JD (U) to contest 16 seats each and LJP to contest six seats and RLSP two seats.

Sources said that if RLSP still does not agree to contest on two seats then the BJP and JD (U) will distribute one seat each between themselves as both the parties are not ready to contest anything less than 16 seats. But the NDA does not want RLSP to go away from the NDA. The NDA does not want to repeat what happened to it in the Assembly elections.