Bihar likely to have 2 deputy CMs; BJP’s Tarkishore Prasad, Renu Devi frontrunners

While Prasad, the MLA from Katihar was on Sunday elected as the BJP’s legislature party leader, Renu Devi, its MLA from Bettiah, was elected as the deputy leader.
The new cabinet in Bihar, under chief minister-elect Nitish Kumar, is likely to have two deputy chief ministers. This is because Kumar’s ally, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday chose Katihar MLA Tarkishore Prasad and Bettiah MLA Renu Devi as the leader and deputy leader respectively of its legislature party, indicating there would be two deputy chief ministers in the state, both from the BJP.

Senior Bihar BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi had served as Kumar’s deputy since July 2017. Modi is now being widely tipped to be moving to the BJP-led government at the Centre.

The BJP had won the second-highest number of seats in the recently-concluded Bihar assembly elections, behind the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), which won 75 seats. The BJP won 74 seats while its ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) ally, the Kumar-led Janata Dal(United) won 43 seats. The Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) and the Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular won four seats each, taking the NDA’s tally to 125 and past the majority mark of 122 in the 243-member Bihar assembly.

Earlier in the day, Kumar was elected as the legislature party leader of the NDA, paving the way for him to return as the chief minister for five more years. Kumar has been in office since 2005, except for a brief period from May 2014 to February 2015. He met Governor Phagu Chauhan and staked claim to form government. Talking to reporters outside his residence upon returning from the Raj Bhavan, Kumar told reporters the swearing-in will take place Monday evening.

The NDA clinched an unlikely victory in the Bihar polls, after almost exit polls had given an edge to the RJD-led opposition alliance, the Mahagathbandhan. The opposition alliance won 110 seats, of which the RJD won 75, the Congress 19 and the Left parties together won 16 seats.

The Bihar assembly elections were held in three phases on October 28, November 3 and November 7. Counting of votes for all 243 assembly constituencies took place on November 10.