On Tuesday, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) released its first list of 71 candidates for the upcoming two-phase Bihar assembly elections set for November 6 and 11. The party has made changes in 15 constituencies and has not granted tickets to three sitting MLAs, including Assembly Speaker and seven-time Patna Sahib MLA Nand Kishore Yadav. Deputy Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary, a current member of the legislative council, will be making his assembly election debut from Tarapur, while Deputy CM Vijay Kumar Sinha is set to contest again from Lakhisarai. Mangal Pandey, who is part of the Nitish Kumar-led NDA government, will run from Siwan.
The candidate list also includes former MPs Ram Kripal Yadav, who will compete from Danapur, and Sunil Kumar Pintu, contesting from Sitamarhi after rejoining the BJP. Notable omissions include MLAs Arun Kumar Sinha (Kumhrar) and Amrendra Pratap Singh (Ara). Newcomer IRS officer Sujit Kumar Singh, who recently joined the BJP, will run from Gaura Bauram, taking the place of his wife Swarna Singh. The initial list features nine women candidates, including Renu Devi, Gayatri Devi, and Rama Nishad. Other key candidates include Prem Kumar from Gaya, former Deputy CM Tarkishore Prasad from Katihar, and Alok Ranjan Jha from Saharsa.
The NDA, which encompasses BJP, JD(U), LJP (Ram Vilas), HAM (Secular), and Rashtriya Lok Morcha, had previously established a seat-sharing agreement: BJP and JD(U) will each contest 101 seats, LJP (RV) will contest 29 seats, and HAM (S) and RLM will each run for six seats. Ongoing discussions are taking place regarding the specific seat allocations among the alliance members.