New Delhi, Nov 16 (IANS) Former Congress leader Shakeel Ahmad, who resigned from the party earlier this week, has raised sharp questions over both the Opposition’s performance in the recent Bihar Assembly elections, including seats distribution to ineligible candidates, claims on 6.5-million voters’ deletion which according to him lacked ground-level evidence, among other issues.  

Speaking to IANS on November 16, Ahmad said the claims that 6.5 million voters were deleted from electoral rolls lack ground-level evidence.

“If such a massive deletion had happened, even a small fraction of affected voters should have protested. At least 65 people should have come forward, even 5,000 should have objected. But nothing like that was seen in Bihar,” he said, adding that no major political party — including the Left, RJD or Congress — mobilised public protests over the issue.

“If votes of innocent people were really deleted, political parties should have taken to the streets. Nothing of that sort happened,” Ahmad remarked.

Commenting on the Bihar election results, the former Congress leader admitted that the Opposition alliance’s performance was “unexpected and shocking”.

Clarifying that he no longer represents the Congress, Ahmad said, “As an independent citizen, I can say the result surprised us too. Nobody expected such a poor performance by our alliance.”

Reflecting on historical voting patterns, the former Congress leader said that Bihar has followed a fixed “section-wise” division since 1995.

“Back then, even when we were not with Lalu Yadav, 85 per cent of certain sections were with him. Over the years, these sections kept dividing, leaving only two sections with our alliance,” he added.

He also said that the Opposition’s gains in 2020 Bihar Assembly poll were largely due to Lok Janshakti Party-Ram Vilas President Chirag Paswan fielding candidates against Janata Dal-United led Nitish Kumar, weakening the NDA.

He also echoed senior Congress leader Tariq Anwar’s criticism of seat-sharing distribution within the Opposition alliance, questioning why candidates who lost by large margins in 2020 were given tickets again.

“There should be an open-criteria. Those who lost by over 100 votes in the 2020 Bihar Assembly elections were denied tickets, but those who lost by 63,000 votes were fielded. What is the logic?” he asked.

On reports that Vikassheel Insaan Party Chief Mukesh Sahani was offered the Deputy CM’s post despite representing only 2–2.5 per cent population while Muslims — 18 per cent of Bihar’s population — were overlooked, Ahmed said the move created a “bad perception”.

According to Ahmad, the message conveyed was that Muslim votes were taken for granted.

He also expressed unease over tickets given to individuals with a BJP-RSS background, saying that had the Opposition alliance won, such candidates might have “returned to the BJP camp”.

The former Congress leader’s critique has intensified internal questions within the Opposition Bloc as parties assess the causes of their electoral setback.

–IANS

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