PATNA: After suffering a humiliating defeat in the last Bihar assembly election, securing a dismal number of seats, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has now decided to launch a countrywide campaign to ensure that all elections are held through ballot papers in future.
At the recently held national executive committee meeting in Patna, the party passed a resolution, contending that ‘dhanbal’ (money power) and 'sattabal' (power of government) were misused to influence 'janbal' (people’s mandate).
At the meeting, Tejashwi Prasad Yadav was named as national working president of the party.
Addressing leaders and workers in the meeting, Tejashwi Yadav said that he would meet Opposition leaders across the country in connection with his party’s proposed programme to launch a countrywide campaign to pressure the Election Commission to hold future elections through ballot papers.
After assuming the post of RJD’s working president, Tejashwi said that his party would make concerted efforts to ensure it regains its recognition as a national party.
Ahead of the 2010 Bihar assembly election, RJD was derecognised as a national party by the Election Commission. Then, five other parties also lost their recognition as a State party. The RJD, which was a recognised party in Bihar, Jharkhand, Manipur and Nagaland, lost its national party recognition following its poor showing in Jharkhand, where the party was derecognised at that time.
“Our party’s national office bearers will visit other states. It will contest elections in other states too,” he added.
After the assembly election results were declared, RJD held irregularities in the EVMs responsible for its poor performance in the state polls.
The party could win only 25 out of 243 seats it contested.
Former Bihar RJD president Jagdanand Singh alleged, “Each EVM had 25,000 votes even before the polling began… and we still managed to win 25 seats. This shows where the country is headed.”
His son and Buxar MP Sudhakar Singh also lent their support to Tejashwi on the issue.
Responding to Singh’s allegations, Bihar chief electoral officer asserted, “The allegation made by Jagdanand Singh that every EVM contained 25,000 pre-loaded votes is technically impossible, procedurally false, and contradicted by statutory records signed by RJD’s own election and polling agents.”