PATNA: NDA's presidential candidate Droupadi Murmu will reach Patna on July 5 to muster electoral support from the country's third most populous state. The election for the President's post is on July 18.
Senior JD(U) leader and state's parliamentary affairs minister Vijay Kumar Choudhary told TOI on Friday that since Murmu is arriving as a candidate of the presidential election, she would stay at a private hotel and meet senior NDA leaders, including MPs and MLAs. Choudhary said the venue of her meeting would be decided in consultation with the BJP.
BJP's state vice-president and media in-charge Rajib Ranjan said the venue for Murmu's meeting would be finalised after BJP state president Dr Sanjay Jaiswal returns from Singapore.
In Bihar, NDA has five partners - BJP, JD(U), HAM(S), RLJP and LJP (RV). They have either MPs or MLAs. The elected members of the Lok Sabha, the Rajya Sabha and state assemblies vote in election for the President's post. Being the fourth largest state by the number of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members and the MLAs, Bihar will play a key role in the presidential election for the NDA candidate.
Currently, Bihar has 40 Lok Sabha and 15 Rajya Sabha members. But the number of Rajya Sabha members would increase to 16 after July 7 when the recently elected members would take oath. The NDA has 39 Lok Sabha and 9 Rajya Sabha members.
Of the 243 MLAs, 127 are with the NDA. Thus, Murmu would have upper hand in securing votes in the state compared to the combined opposition's candidate Yashwant Sinha.
