Bihar election results were declared in the early hours of Wednesday morning (File)
New Delhi:
Opposition parties’ allegations that winning candidates of the Bihar election were not given confirmatory certificates are not based on facts, Election Commission sources said Friday, adding counting was “completely transparent” and “done in front of all political parties”.
All political parties were given round-wise reports and no allegations were raised at that time, poll body sources further said, calling on opposition parties – led by Tejashwi Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Congress – to admit the public mandate instead of levelling allegations.
On Tuesday, as the votes were being counted – a process that took over 15 hours because of Covid-related restrictions – the opposition claimed that their candidates were not being given winning certificates due to pressure from Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his government.
The RJD released a list of 119 seats and claimed that although these had been won by the opposition alliance, the winning candidates had not received their certificates.
The party tweeted: “… Nitish Kumar administration is delaying counting in 10 seats. Candidates who won have not been given certificates… Nitish Kumar and Sushil Kumar are making the Chief Secretary exert pressure on officials for seats with close margins.”
The Congress backed up these claims, saying one of their candidates had not receive a certificate.
The Election Commission hit back in a late-night press conference and pointed out that at the time of the RJD’s claims, results for only 146 (of 243) seats had been declared.
The BJP-led NDA recorded a closely-fought win over the opposition alliance led by Mr Yadav.
The BJP and Nitish Kumar’s JDU, with two smaller allies, claimed 125 seats to the opposition’s 110. The BJP won 74 seats and the JDU 43. Mr Yadav’s RJD emerged as the single-largest party with 75 seats; the Congress won 19. The rest were won by smaller parties and independent candidates.
Throughout the day, there was a tight race between the ruling and opposition coalitions.
In the morning, a tough contest was on in nearly 70 seats, where the margin of lead was less than 1,000 votes. By the evening, the number of seats narrowed down to 20, where the margin of lead was less than 600 votes.
