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The Congress believes that if the NDA is leaning heavily on the Modi factor, even if Nitish is the face, then the opposition needs a counterweight
The Mahagathbandhan, which includes RJD, Congress, Left parties, VIP, and others, is yet to decide a CM face. (News18 Hindi)
The race for 2025 Bihar Assembly elections has officially kicked off, and the political equations are shifting fast. The NDA has made its position clear with Nitish Kumar as their chief ministerial face once again. But over in the Mahagathbandhan camp, things are far less settled.
At the heart of the uncertainty is one big question: who will be the face of the opposition alliance? Will it be RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, who nearly brought the alliance to power in 2020? Or will the Congress push for national leader Rahul Gandhi to take centre stage?
The Mahagathbandhan, which includes RJD, Congress, Left parties, VIP, and others, is split on the issue. RJD, the dominant force in the coalition, has already declared Tejashwi as its CM candidate. He too, has made no secret of his ambition. In April this year, during the massive ‘Mushar-Bhuiya Maharally’ in Patna, Tejashwi publicly staked his claim to the top job.
Tejashwi was the face of the alliance in the 2020 elections, where RJD won 75 seats, the highest for any single party, and pushed the NDA to the brink. Since then, he’s continued to grow in popularity, especially among the youth, by relentlessly targeting the Nitish-Modi government on jobs and education. He also remains central to the Yadav-Muslim vote bank, a crucial caste arithmetic in Bihar politics. Multiple surveys have placed him as the most preferred CM choice after Nitish Kumar.
So why the debate?
The Congress believes that if the NDA is leaning heavily on the Modi factor, even if Nitish is the face, then the opposition needs a counterweight. In their eyes, that counterweight is Rahul Gandhi.
Rahul’s visibility in Bihar has gone up sharply. He has held multiple rallies, taken part in key protests like the 9 July Bihar Bandh against voter list revisions, and even shared stage space with Tejashwi, a first for such a high-profile agitation. According to the Congress party, Rahul is not just active, but symbolically important. After the Bharat Jodo and Nyay Yatras, he has become the central figure of the national opposition.
Congress insiders say they’re not projecting Rahul as a CM face, that’s off the table. But they believe the Mahagathbandhan should contest with Rahul as the broader political face of the campaign. Their argument is that this would help unify secular votes and give the alliance a national coherence in its messaging.
But the push for Rahul is not just about visibility. It’s also about leverage.
Behind the scenes, there’s tension brewing over seat-sharing. Congress wants more seats this time, pointing to its Lok Sabha performance. But Tejashwi, buoyed by his 2020 success and emboldened by RJD’s continued dominance, isn’t willing to be too generous. The Congress, aware of its weakened state in Bihar, is playing pressure politics, demanding a bigger role in leadership decisions to strengthen its bargaining power.
Figures like Kanhaiya Kumar and Pappu Yadav, both influential but polarising, have complicated the consensus around Tejashwi. Their presence signals internal fault lines within the broader alliance.
In June, Congress’s Bihar in-charge Krishna Allavaru said the CM face would be decided by “consensus” among all allies. That statement alone was enough to signal that a clear endorsement of Tejashwi is far from locked.
So now, as the Mahagathbandhan juggles seat-sharing maths, caste dynamics, and leadership optics, it is clear that the alliance does not have a unified face yet. And with the NDA already hitting the ground with a clear pitch, the longer the opposition takes to settle this, the more ground they risk losing.
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- Location :
Bihar, India, India
- First Published:
