Four of Owaisi's 5 AIMIM MLAs join RJD

New Delhi: In a major setback to Asaduddin Owaisi, who heads AIMIM, four of the five MLAs of his party in Bihar joined the RJD on Wednesday. With this, the RJD has now regained its single-largest party status in the 243-member Bihar Legislative Assembly leaving behind the BJP.

The four AIMIM MLAs who joined RJD include Muhammed Izhar Asfi, who represents Kochadamam Assembly seat, Shahnawaz Alam, MLA from Jokihat seat, Syed Ruknuddin, MLA from Baisi seat, and Azhar Nayeemi representing Bahadurgunj Assembly constituency. Only AIMIM state president and Amour MLA Akhtarul Iman – an RJD turncoat – has not switched his side.

Prior to the joining of AIMIM MLAs, the RJD had 76 MLAs, while BJP's tally increased to 77 MLAs after all three MLAs of the Vikassheel Insaan Party joined it three months ago. Now, RJD has 80 MLAs to its side.

Though RJD has become the single largest party in the state with the Grand Alliance under its leadership now having 115 MLAs, including 19 of the Congress and 16 of CPI (ML) and the CPI, the party is still seven short of the simple majority. Even if former Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) decides to switch sides with its four MLAs, the Grand Alliance will still be short of the majority mark as the Nitish Kumar-led NDA enjoys a majority in the House with 127 MLAs in its side.

Welcoming AIMIM MLAs to the party, Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Prasad Yadav said: "We firmly believe all the four MLAs would work towards our goal of social justice and secularism. We have always got the love of the people of Seemanchal."

Commenting on the development, Bihar BJP spokesperson Nikhil Anand said: "RJD is a political shop of bigotry and appeasement. On the one hand, Owaisi is directly or indirectly instigating Muslims across the country to become fanatics and join terrorist activities, while on the other hand, four MLAs of AIMIM in Bihar have joined hands with a family-oriented party that is famous for openly supporting bigotry and doing appeasement politics."

"By the way, seeing the antics of Owaisi, it seems that he may have sold his MLAs by taking money from RJD," said Anand, who is also BJP OBC Morcha's national general secretary.