Paswan says he made a general statement on working with RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, but ‘it doesn’t mean party joining RJD alliance’.
The Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) will remain with the BJP-led NDA, its parliamentary board chairman Chirag Paswan told ThePrint Friday, amid mounting speculation that his party was looking to join hands with the Rashtriya Janta Dal (RJD).
“As chairman of the party’s parliamentary board, I can say with full authority that the LJP will contest the 2019 elections with the BJP,” Paswan told ThePrint.
He added that while his party had raised issues of Dalits, they have been suitably addressed.
“There are genuine concerns of Dalit atrocities and our party takes it very seriously but whenever we have raised these concerns, the current NDA government has taken corrective steps,” he said.
On reports that he had expressed a willingness to work the RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, Chirag said, “I was asked a question, as both Tejashwi and I share the same vision of development for the state, that if we could work together. I said ‘why not’. But that doesn’t mean our party is joining the alliance in Bihar.”
Father too denies RJD switch
LJP president Ram Vilas Paswan, Chirag’s father also dismissed speculation that the party was looking to join the RJD.
“Minor differences are common among two alliance partners but we are not leaving the NDA. Besides, the RJD is a party where the youngsters don’t respect the elders. Why would anyone join their alliance,” Paswan asked.
His remarks come a day after senior RJD leader Raghuvansh Prasad Singh claimed that the LJP would join the grand alliance in Bihar.
“Ram Vilas Paswanji has realised that the BJP will not win this time and he will join us in the grand alliance,” Singh had said.
The mounting speculation of an LJP switch comes amid another NDA ally, the JD(U), giving the BJP a tough time over seat-sharing in Bihar.
Chirag, however, said his party has not yet broached the subject of seat-sharing. “But I am sure that at the right time, leaders of both the LJP and BJP will sit together and resolve the seat issue amicably. There is no question of us joining the RJD alliance,” he said.