Patna: The main opposition Grand Alliance, headed by 31-year-old Tejashwi Yadav and son of prominent Indian politician Lalu Prasad, appears set to form the next government in Bihar, majority of exit polls predicted today.
Multiple exit poll surveys predict an edge for the Tejashwi-led Grand Alliance over NDA in a huge setback to chief Nitish Kumar who has been in the saddle for the past 15 years. Kumar contested the elections in alliance with the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) this time.
Of all the opinion polls, today’s Chanakya has predicted a complete edge of the Tejashwi-led alliance over the NDA. According to their survey, the Grand Alliance seems to be getting a lion’s share of 44 per cent votes against 34 per cent votes likely to go to NDA’s share.
Times Now-C Voter survey gives 120 seats to the Grand Alliance and 116 to the NDA. ABP-CVoter survey gives 108-131 seats to Grand Alliance against 104-128 to the NDA.
Republic TV-Jan Ki Baat has given 128 to 138 seats to the Grand Alliance and 91-117 seats to the NDA while TV-9-Bharatvarsh opinion poll has given almost equal seats to both alliances—115-125 seats to the Grand Alliance and 110-120 seats to the NDA.
Different election
This election was entirely different from others in various ways. The existing record showed Nitish Kumar had been the balancing factor in Bihar elections but the opinion polls appear to be bulldozing the myth.
Again, it was the NDA which had been setting the agenda for the poll campaign in every election but this was for the first time that it was forced to toe Grand Alliance’s line. From Day One, Tejashwi focused his campaign around unemployment, migration, healthcare and education, and never deviated from these till the end.
Eventually, the NDA was compelled to promise two million jobs to the youths while it initially tried to bring emotive issues in the campaign.
Again, Tejashwi was the lone star campaigner of his alliance against the NDA which fielded an army of leaders, such as Prime Minister Narendra Modi, 10 Union ministers, BJP president, several parliamentarians and national spokespersons while chief minister Nitish Kumar was already there.
