LJP's oversized Bihar seat demands test BJP strategy

Chirag Paswan's party presses exaggerated seat claims, straining BJP's electoral patience.

- ABHINANDAN MISHRA

In Bihar, Chirag Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party is once again demanding far more seats than its record suggests-forty to seventy in the 243-member assembly-leaving Home Minister Amit Shah to manage an ally whose bargaining habits outstrip its strike rate.

While most political observers see it as a foregone conclusion that the LJP will even fall short of its minimum demand of forty seats, BJP leaders in Bihar argue that this kind of "pressurebuilding flexing" should no longer be indulged, as it makes the party and the alliance look weak.

The LJP's demand for forty assembly seats in Bihar, out of a house of 243, is the latest chapter in its long habit of punching above its weight. On paper that number would give the party about 16.5 percent of the state assembly. In practice its record makes such a share implausible.

Since it first contested in 2005, the party has fielded candidates in 632 assembly constituencies and won 45 of them-a conversion rate of barely 7 percent. Over those years it has polled roughly 12 million votes, which sounds formidable in absolute terms, but those votes have been spread thin across five elections. An analysis of the party's electoral geography shows that its candidates are mostly stuck at third places.