Mahagathbandhan, (MGB,

ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...

: ''Mahāgaṭhabaṁdhana'') also known as Grand Alliance, is a

coalition A coalition is formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political, military, or economic spaces. Formation According to ''A G ...

of political parties in the Eastern state of

Bihar Bihar ( ) is a states and union territories of India, state in Eastern India. It is the list of states and union territories of India by population, second largest state by population, the List of states and union territories of India by are ...

in India, formed ahead of the 2015 Vidhan Sabha elections in Bihar. The alliance consists of

Rashtriya Janata Dal The Rashtriya Janata Dal ( RJD; translation: National People's Party) is an Indian political party, mainly based in the state of Bihar. The party was founded in 1997 by Lalu Prasad Yadav. The party's support base has traditionally been Other ...

(RJD),

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party, or simply the Congress, is a political parties in India, political party in India with deep roots in most regions of India. Founded on 28 December 1885, it was the first mo ...

(INC) and

Left Left may refer to: Music * ''Left'' (Hope of the States album), 2006 * ''Left'' (Monkey House album), 2016 * ''Left'' (Helmet album), 2023 * "Left", a song by Nickelback from the album ''Curb'', 1996 Direction * Left (direction), the relativ ...

parties including

Communist Party of India The Communist Party of India (CPI) is a political party in India. The CPI considers the Foundation of the Communist Party of India, December 26, 1925 Cawnpore (Kanpur) conference as its foundation date. Between 1946 and 1951, the CPI led m ...

(CPI), Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) Liberation-CPIML (Liberation) and

Communist Party of India (Marxist) The Communist Party of India (Marxist) (abbreviated as CPI(M)) is a Communism in India, communist List of political parties in India, political party in India. It is the largest communist party in India in terms of membership and electora ...

(CPIM), with Tejashwi Yadav as the chairperson.

History

Creation of the alliance (2015-2020)

On 7 June 2015, Lalu Prasad Yadav announced the RJD was joining in an alliance with the JD(U) for the election. On 13 July 2015, he led a march demanding that the central government release its findings from the

Socio Economic Caste Census 2011 The Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 (SECC) was conducted for the 2011 Census of India. The Second ministry of Manmohan Singh, Manmohan Singh government approved the Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 to be carried out after discussion in ...

(SECC) on caste. Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan supported a comprehensive classification of caste data of SECC 2011 before its release. BJP Leader Sushil Kumar Modi called for a rectification of errors in the cases of 1.46 crore people in India, including 1.75 lakh in Bihar, before releasing the caste data. On 3 August, incumbent

Chief Minister A chief minister is an elected or appointed head of government of – in most instances – a sub-national entity, for instance an administrative subdivision or federal constituent entity. Examples include a state (and sometimes a union ter ...

Nitish Kumar declared that he would not stand in the election. On 11 August, he announced the seat-sharing formula, according to which JD(U) and RJD will contest 100 seats each, while Congress will contest 40 seats in Bihar. NCP pulled out of this alliance later. On 23 September, Nitish Kumar announced the list of 242 candidates for the JDU-RJD-INC alliance. OBCs were most favoured in the alliance ticket distribution plan. 10% of tickets were allotted to women candidate by the alliance. Nitish Kumar was the declared chief ministerial candidate for the ''Mahagathbandhan'' (Grand Alliance). Kumar started his ''Har Ghar Dastak'' (door-to-door) campaign on 2 July. Initially there were definite political overtures when both Lalu Prasad Yadav and Nitish Kumar shared stage together in a public event commemorating former chief minister Satyendra Narain Sinha's birth anniversary that witnessed veiled attacks on each other, the last time they did it in public. Prashant Kishor was a key election strategist for the alliance. The Mahagathbandhan contested in Bihar legislative assembly elections of 2015 against

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; , ) is a political party in India and one of the two major List of political parties in India, Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. BJP emerged out from Syama Prasad Mukherjee's ...

and its key allies Lok Janshakti Party and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party. The Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies lost badly making the way for JD (U)+RJD+Congress to triumph with 178 out of 243 seats. The BJP and its allies managed to get only 58 seats.

Dissent and defection (2020-2022)

After successfully winning the elections of 2015, the defection in Mahagathbandhan occurred with alleged attempt of

leaders to break Janata Dal (United) elected legislators. Nitish Kumar, the then leader of JD(U) and the Chief Minister for fifth time was thus forced to join the

and NDA once again to secure the interest of his parties. However, the entry of JD (U) made other allies of Bhartiya Janata Party embarrassed . Thus the rival party of JD (U), Rashtriya Lok Samata Party drifted away with its leader

Upendra Kushwaha Upendra Kumar Singh, commonly known as Upendra Kushwaha (born 6 February 1960) is an Indian politician, and a former Member of Bihar Legislative Council and Bihar Legislative Assembly. He has also served as Minister of State for Human Resources ...

from the hold of NDA. The drifting away of Rashtriya Lok Samata Party created uncertainties in the camp of National Democratic Alliance over shifting of the support of Koeri caste on whom RLSP was thought to have strong hold. But in 2019

General Elections A general election is an electoral process to choose most or all members of a governing body at the same time. They are distinct from by-elections, which fill individual seats that have become vacant between general elections. General elections ...

the JD(U) balanced the loss incurred due to the defection of Upendra Kushwaha and Bharatiya Janata Party and Janata Dal (United) secured victory over the putatively put alliance of RJD+ RLSP+ INC+ HAM+ VIP parties. Subsequently, VIP and HAM switched to the NDA and the RLSP merged with JD(U).

Return to power (2022-2023)

In August 2022,

Janata Dal (United) Janata Dal (United) ("People's Party (United)"), abbreviated as JD(U), is a Social democracy, social-democratic and secular List of political parties in India, Indian political party, rooted mainly in East India, eastern and Northeast India, ...

, Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) Liberation,

and Hindustan Awam Morcha joined again to form 2/3rd Majority

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a State (polity), state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive (government), execu ...

Bihar Legislative Assembly The Bihar Legislative Assembly, also known as the Bihar Vidhan Sabha, is the lower house of the bicameral Bihar Legislature of the state of Bihar in India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is ...

Departure of the JD(U) (2024)

On 28 January 2024,

officially left the Mahagathbandhan to join the National Democratic Alliance for the third time, which also ended the tenure of Tejashwi Yadav, the RJD's candidate and leader of the Mahagathbandhan, as Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar. The political crisis was caused by Nitish Kumar feeling "insulted" by the Mahagathbandhan and the larger Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance.

Current members

Electoral performance

Indian general election results (in Bihar)

Past members

References

External links

2020 Bihar State Elections
{{Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance, state=collapsed

2020 Bihar Legislative Assembly election 2020 in Indian politics Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance Political parties established in 2015 Political party alliances in India