Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar remains hopeful of bringing back Samajwadi Party to their secular alliance in the state.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is confident of bringing back Mulayam Singh Yadav back to the grand alliance against the BJP led National Democratic Alliance in Bihar, after the Samajwadi Party (SP) chief walked out yesterday for not being consulted over seat sharing for the upcoming assembly elections.
"I had a talk with Mulayam Singh Yadav day before yesterday and I did not have the inkling that SP would take the decision to quit. Shivpal Singh Yadav (Mulayam's brother and UP minister) was sent to represent the party in the 'Swambhiman rally' on August 30," said the chief minister.
Earlier today, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad left for Delhi to placate the SP chief, but refused to answer any questions. Both leaders also have family ties.
Mr Kumar said, "We are trying to figure out as to what happened that SP took the decision to quit the grand secular alliance... No final word has come from SP. JD(U) President Sharad Yadav met the SP chief yesterday and will meet him again today."
Under the seat-sharing formula, Janata Dal United or the JD(U) and RJD were initially allotted 100 seats, the Congress got 40, while Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) was given 3 seats out of the 243-member assembly seats.
Last week, the NCP had walked out of the alliance for being given less seats. Mr Prasad had then allotted these three and two more seats from his party's quota and offered five seats to the SP.
"We worked very hard for merger of splinter parties of old Janata Parivar which due to some reasons could not be achieved. But, that is another issue," added Mr Kumar, who still remains hopeful of bringing back the SP to their fold.