Jailed criminal from Nitish’s camp wins

PATNA - A criminal-turned-politician now in jail for murder Wednesday won in Bihar — on the Janata Dal-United (JD-U) ticket. And many such candidates have made it to the Bihar assembly.

Notwithstanding the murder charges, the chief minister had sought votes for Ran Vijay Singh, who won from Goh constituency. He is in the Daudnagar jail.

Singh has been in jail for over three years following a shootout at a polling booth in 2005.

Ironically, most such candidates from JD-U and its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) tasted victory.

But similar contestants from Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Ramvilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and the Congress had to suffer defeat.

Other such JD-U winners are Anant Singh, Dhumal Singh, Sunil Pandey and Neeraj Kumar Singh.

Pandey and Anant Singh were considered “terror” in their respective strongholds of Piro in Bhojpur district and Mokamah in Patna district.

Other JD-U winners with criminal records includw Sarfaraz Alam and Bucchan Yadav. The charges against them include extortion, kidnapping and murder.

Alam, son of controversial former central minister Mohammad Taslimuddin, contested from Jokihat.

JD-U’s Lesi Singh, wife of slain ganglord Butan Singh, won from Dhamdaha constituency.

Others JD-U winners are Bima Bharti, wife of gangster Awadesh Mandal, Punam Devi, wife of criminal-turned-politician Ranvir Yadav, and Annu Shukla (Lalganj), wife of JD-U legislator Munna Shukla, who is currently in jail for the murder of former Bihar minister Brijbihari Prasad.

The BJP camp’s ‘criminal’ winners include Munni Devi, Damyanti Devi, wife of gangster Bhagir Yadav, Nityanand Rai and Chitranjan Kumar, a former member from Pandav Sena, a private upper caste militia.

The only RJD criminal-turned-politician winner is Surendra Prasad Yadav, a former minister, who won from Belaganj in Gaya district.

The ‘bahubalis’ who were defeated include LJP’s Rama Singh and Shankar Singh, who heads a private militia.

Congress candidate Lovely Anand, wife of criminal-turned-politician Anand Mohan, and Ranjeet Ranjan, wife of former MP Rajiv Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Communist Party of India-Marxist leader Ajit Sarkar, were also defeated.