PATNA: Bihar minister Mukesh Sahani appeared to be on a collision course with the ruling NDA in the state when on Sunday he announced his Vikassheel Insaan Party's foray into the elections for 24 seats in the legislative council.
Notably, the BJP has announced its candidates for 12 of the seats while Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JD(U) is contesting one less the number.
The two parties have left one seat for the Rashtriya Lok Janshakti Party of Union minister Pashupati Kumar Paras.
Sahani announced his VIP's candidates for seven of the seats besides expressing "support to NDA nominees" for 15 others.
Interestingly, all the seven seats which the VIP intends to fight are being contested by the BJP.
Sahani was brought into the NDA ahead of the 2020 assembly polls at the instance of Union Home Minister Amit Shah whom he had met after quitting the RJD-led Grand Alliance.
However, his relationship with the saffron party soured during the recently concluded Uttar Pradesh assembly polls.
Sahani's party had contested more than 50 seats in UP and though it failed to make any impact in the adjacent state, the Bihar minister's vitriolic attacks on the BJP as part of campaign have ruffled many feathers here.
Sahani has also announced that he will not be giving up his claim on Bochahan assembly seat for which by-elections have been announced.
The seat fell vacant upon the death of VIP MLA Musafir Paswan.
A section of BJP MLAs, who are peeved over Sahani's "thanklessness", have been in favour of the party fielding its own candidate in Bochahan.
Sahani had lost his own seat in the assembly elections but was sworn in as a member of the state cabinet at the instance of the BJP, which got him elected to the legislative council from a seat vacated by one of its MLCs.
Quite a few BJP leaders have also been of the view that Sahani, the term of whose legislative council seat expires in a couple of months, be "taught a lesson" by denial of another term, which would make it problematic for him to continue as a minister.