Patna: Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav on Thursday accused Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of coming back to power through “chor darwaza” (backdoor) and raised doubts over the electoral process in the state, in his first remarks after the vote count on Tuesday.
Tejashwi appeared to allege fraud in postal ballot count and demanded recount in 20 seats where Mahagathbandhan candidates lost by a marginal number of votes.
“We demand recounting of postal ballots in all those constituencies where these were counted at the end, and not in the beginning. It is surprising that the NDA got only 12,270 votes more than Mahagathbandhan, and yet managed to win 15 more seats,” Tejashwi told a press conference, shortly after being unanimously elected by the Mahagathbandhan MLAs as their leader.
“We lost 20 seats by a wafer-thin margin. In many constituencies, as many as 900 postal ballots were invalidated,” the RJD leader alleged, casting doubts on the electoral process
Tejashwi also hit out at the Election Commission over the Bihar Assembly Election results, and claimed: “People’s verdict came in favour of us, while Election Commission’s results were in favour of the NDA.”
Tejashwi accused the ruling coalition of achieving poll victory through “dhan, chhal and bal (money, muscle and deceit)” and added: “The BJP-JD(U) have formed the government through chor darwaza (backdoor).”