Patna: As Bihar gears up for a high-stakes assembly election later this year, Union minister and Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) president Chirag Paswan is set to sound the election bugle with a major public rally on Sunday, June 8 in the politically crucial Shahabad region.
The rally in Ara—billed as the party’s Nav Sankalp Mahasabha—is being closely watched across the political spectrum, amid talk that Chirag may contest the assembly elections himself. The party has proposed that its national president fight from an assembly seat in the Shahabad region, with insiders indicating the possibility of him opting for a general seat.
“Our aim is to make this rally historic,” said Arun Bharti, LJP (Ram Vilas) MP and state in-charge. “We expect over one lakh people to attend.” Chirag is expected to once again invoke his signature slogan Bihar First, Bihari First during the rally.
Shahabad is a region where the NDA performed dismally in both the 2020 assembly elections and the last Lok Sabha polls. Of the 20 assembly seats in the region, the NDA secured just two in 2020. In last year’s general election, NDA allies failed to win any of Shahabad’s four Lok Sabha seats—Sasaram, Karakat, Ara, and Buxar—all of which were taken by the opposition. Reclaiming this political ground has now emerged as a key challenge for the NDA ahead of the state polls.
Meanwhile, another NDA constituent, Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Morcha (RLM), is also set to flex its political muscle. On the same day, June 8, Kushwaha will inaugurate the party’s Constitutional Rights Delimitation Reform Maha Rally in Muzaffarpur. Workers from 13 districts are expected to participate, with four promotional chariots already criss-crossing the Tirhut, Saran and Darbhanga regions.
Both rallies will serve as early indicators of the election messaging and grassroots mobilisation efforts of the two smaller NDA partners, even as the alliance has reportedly finalised its seat-sharing formula. Sources indicate that the JD(U) is likely to contest 102 to 103 seats, the BJP 101 to 102, LJP (Ram Vilas) 25 to 28, Hindustani Awam Morcha 6 to 7, and RLM 4 to 5.
For Chirag, Sunday’s rally may mark the start of a new phase in his political journey, with his possible assembly run signalling a deeper engagement in state politics. For the NDA, the rallies will offer a test of strength—and a glimpse of whether its smaller partners can help reverse recent setbacks in regions like Shahabad.
