Patna: The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) on Tuesday evening accused Nitish Kumar of pressuring local election officials to withhold results on 10 seats won by the Mahagatbandhan.
Issuing a list of 119 candidates, RJD alleged that the election officials initially congratulated their candidates but later told them that they have lost the election.
“This is the list of 119 seats where counting has been completed and candidates of the grand alliance have won them. The Returning Officers initially congratulated the candidates but later told them that they have lost the election,” the RJD said in a post on its Twitter account in Hindi.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission said it has never worked under anybody's pressure and refuted the RJD's allegations about not giving winning certificates to candidates of the Mahagatbandhan.
"About an hour ago at 9 pm, a message was broadcast by a political party on social media that it has won 119 seats. Our website is in the public domain. The factual status is that we have published results for 146 seats while for 97 seats we have published trends till then," ECI official Chandra Bhushan said.
ECI Secretary-General Umesh Sinha said that there could be a possibility of counting postal ballots in seats where margins are very less.
"Several results have been obtained till 10 pm. The margins are very less in the assembly elections. There could be a scenario to count the postal ballots by candidates in such seats where margins are less," he said.
Besides, the Election Commission of India (ECI) will hold a press briefing at 1 am, reported ANI.
As per latest updates, results have been declared for 183 seats out of the total 243. NDA has won 90 seats (BJP 51, JDU 32, VIP 4, HAM 3) and Mahagathbandhan has won 86 seats (RJD 60, Congress 14, Left 12). AIMIM wons 4; BSP won 1, & Independent won 1 seat.
