Union ministers from Bihar turn out flop show

Patna: The Union Ministers of the NDA from Bihar turned out a dismal performance for the alliance in the Bihar Assembly elections which was swept by the Grand Alliance of the JD(U), RJD and Congress with a two-thirds majority, enabling a third term as chief minister for Nitish Kumar. The only saving grace was Agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh's Lok Sabha constituency Purvi Champaran returning a good number of MLAs.

In Purvi Champaran, the NDA won four out of six Assembly segments. Three - Motihari, Kalyanpur and Pipra -- of these were won by the BJP while Govindganj was bagged by its ally, the LJP.

The NDA won eight out of 12 Assembly seats in the Puriv Champaran district. Singh, a veteran BJP leader from the state, is a member of the Modi Cabinet from May 2014.

Union ministers Upendra Kushwaha and Ram Kripal Yadav turned out extremely poor performances, winning only one seat each for the alliance from their respective constituencies of Karakat and Pataliputra.

Kushwaha, minister of state for human resource development, is the leader of the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) which had put up 23 candidates across the state. The party won only two of these seats.

Yadav, a former RJD leader, joined BJP before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, and represents Pataliputra in Lok Sabha and is minister of state for drinking water and sanitation in the Modi-led government. He could ensure victory in Danapur Assembly segment alone in his parliamentary constituency, the other five seats going to the Grand Alliance.

Ram Vilas Paswan, Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Giriraj Singh are the other Lok Sabha members in the Union Cabinet. Two more ministers from Bihar, Ravi Shankar Prasad and Dharmendra Pradhan,  represent the state in the Rajya Sabha. Pradhan, minister of petroleum and natural gas, is from Odisha but represents Bihar in the upper House.

Rudy, MP from Saran and minister of state (Independent charge) for Skill Development and Parliamentary Affairs, could win only two out of six seats for the NDA. Similarly, Hajipur MP Paswan and Nawada MP Giriraj Singh won two seats each for the BJP-led alliance.
 
Paswan is the minister of Consumer Affairs and public distribution while Singh is minister of state for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises.
 
The parties led by Paswan and Kushwaha, and the third ally, Jitan Ram Manjhi-led Hindustani Awaam Morcha, could win only five out of the 83 seats which they contested in Bihar.