Bihar: Four All India Majlis e Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) MLAs on Wednesday joined the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in Bihar. This follows the party's November 2020 Assembly Elections performance in the Eastern state, where it had managed to secure five seats out of the 20 it contested. Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav reached the state legislative assembly on Wednesday alongside the four MLAs, who practically make RJD the single largest party in the Bihar assembly.
In 2020, the five AIMIM MLAs who secured victory were Akhtarul Iman (Amour), Muhammed Izhar Asfi (Kochadamam), Shahnawaz Alam (Jokihat), Syed Ruknuddin (Baisi), and Azhar Nayeemi (Bahadurgunj). Barring Iman, all others have joined the RJD and increased its strength to 80 MLAs in the 243-member assembly.
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The Hyderabad-based AIMIM had contested the 2015 elections in Bihar, but could not make a mark. It tasted its first electoral success in Bihar in 2019, as it secured the Kishanganj seat. In 2020, the party was a constituent in the Grand Democratic Secular Front, putting its candidates up for a fight in all 243 constituencies and having Upendra Kushwaha as a Chief Ministerial face. Kushwaha's party, RLSP (Rashtriya Lok Samata Party), was however merged with CM Nitish Kumar's ruling JD(U) later in March 2021.
After the 2020 elections, RJD had 75 MLAs, while BJP had 74. Three MLAs of the Vikassheel Insan Party, part of the NDA coalition, had subsequently joined BJP, taking the latter's numbers to 77. Meanwhile, in 2022, RJD won the Bochahan assembly seat during by-elections, which increased its count to 76 and is now set to further increase it to a single-largest figure of 80.
