Bhagalpur Lok Sabha election: NOTA worries NDA camp

BHAGALPUR: With just 12 days to go for Lok Sabha polls in Bhagalpur constituency, the None of the Above (NOTA) option of the Election Commission of India has become the most talked about acronym in political circles here.
The NDA, which has fielded JD(U)’s Ajay Mandal from the seat to take on sitting RJD MP Shailesh Kumar alias Bulo Mandal, has not forgotten the bitter experience of 2014 Lok Sabha elections when Bulo Mandal had trounced BJP’s two-time MP from the seat, Shahnawaz Hussain, by a narrow margin of 9,004 votes.The number of votes which went to the NOTA bag was 11,875.
“If I don’t like any of the candidates, I have the option to press the NOTA button,” said a local. On social media platforms too, supporters of NDA as well as Grand Alliance have been commenting that NOTA is like wasting the voting rights given to people.
“People are fed up with false promises of politicians. Many of them are keen to use NOTA option,” said Nandikesh, who is active in social circles here.
Coordination between NDA allies is also a big issue in the constituency. The state BJP headquarters at Patna was aware of the problem that could be caused by ceding the Bhagalpur seat to the JD(U). Workers of the two bigger NDA partners – BJP and the JD(U) – are gelling, or so it seems. However, PM Narendra Modi’s proposed Bhagalpur visit on April 15 has forced the BJP’s state leaders to do the trouble-shooting job.
Party’s state general secretary (organisation) Nagendra Ji held a meeting of the BJP workers, putting stress on active coordination between the BJP and JD(U). It showed its sterling effect on Friday, as at least six BJP functionaries arrived at the JD(U) election office to advise them on how to go about it. The JD(U) functionaries were told to prune the list of their party members to six for inclusion in the coordination committee.
Asked about the level of coordination among the NDA partners, JD(U) state general secretary and incharge of the party’s election unit at Bhagalpur Paramhans Kumar said, “The BJP has extensive organisational base here. The JD(U), on the other hand, has structure and the LJP also counts to some extent. There is perfect coordination among the three parties. Our one common aim and resolution is to make Narendra Modi the country’s PM again.”
He denied that factionalism in the Bhagalpur BJP was harming the common interest of the NDA, insisting that the people of the constituency would rise above caste, community and religious considerations and rally around the JD(U) candidate. He added that when the crunch time would come, the NOTA would not be a factor.