Kanhaiya Kumar's debut in the 2019 elections on a Left Front ticket was expected.
With parliamentary elections still a year-and-a-half away, the Left Front in Bihar is uncertain about lot of things. But one thing they have already managed to decide is that Kanhaiya Kumar, the former student leader from Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University, will run for parliament and is most likely to do so from his home district Begusarai.
Mr Kumar will contest on a Communist Party of India (CPI) ticket but he will represent the Left Front, CPI National Council Secretary KR Naraina, who was in Patna to participate in the state executive meeting, said on Sunday.
Mr Kumar's candidature was on the cards but Mr Naraina said Left leaders also wanted to field him from Kerala. But the party's Bihar unit thinks that a victory will be most certain for the first-timer if he contests from his home state.
Kanhaiya Kumar may be a first-timer in electoral politics but the 30-year-old Left leader gained significant recognition and following after a prolonged controversy last year over an event in JNU
where anti-India slogans were allegedly raised.
Leaders of the Left feel that their first task would be to make Mr Kumar a candidate of the a combined opposition. One that would ideally also include the Lalu Yadav's Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Congress. Although Mr Yadav has formally not yet responded to such suggestions, in private, he has always believed to have maintained that Kanhaiya Kumar could be one of the strongest candidates to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led BJP and Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal United.
Mr Kumar, who was attending a literature festival in Bengaluru, has not reacted to this announcement so far. However, sources close to him say that he has already started preparations for an effective debut. Every month he spends at least 10 days touring different parts of Bihar, sources said, but he keeps his travel under the radar.