BJP seat offer for 2019 election 'not respectable': RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha

Union Minister of State (MoS) for HRD and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) president Upendra Kushwaha said on Saturday that the BJP's offer of seats to his party for the 2019 general election was "not respectable".

However, the chief of RLSP, an NDA ally, did not disclose the number of seats offered to his party and said he would not speak about it before a seat-sharing agreement is reached by NDA constituents in Bihar by November 30.

Speaking to reporters after the RLSP state executive meeting said he will try to speak to "no other BJP leader except the prime minister" after his efforts to meet BJP president Amit Shah did not yield results.

The RLSP chief is at loggerheads with Nitish Kumar over the Bihar chief minister's recent remarks against him. Kumar, also the JD(U) president, had refused to join the issue with Kushwaha over seat-sharing between NDA partners in Bihar, saying "Itna neeche baat ko nahi le jaiye" (do not take the debate to such a low level.

Kushwaha appears to have picked up the word "neeche" from the statement and took it as an insult to himself as the RLSP chief was the topic of discussion. He alleged that the remark was tantamount to calling him a lowly person.

He has also targeted BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi for defending Kumar, signalling his growing isolation within the coalition. When asked about this, he had said, "I am in the NDA as of now."

Bihar has a total of 40 Lok Sabha seats. The BJP and the JD(U) have decided to contest equal number of seats. The fourth partner of the NDA in Bihar is Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (LJP).