Bihar: Nitish Kumar Wins Floor Test With 129 Votes As Three RJD MLAs Switch Sides; Here's A Brief Profile Of Them

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar won floor test with 129 votes on Monday (12 February) as three Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MLAs switched sides by cross-voting. They were Prahlad Yadav, Neelam Devi and Chetan Anand.

Chetan Anand is the son of Anand Mohan Singh, a former Bihar legislator who was jailed in the murder case of a public servant. He is a Rajput by caste and had spoken against RJD MP Manoj Jha's statement in the Rajya Sabha.

Chetan Anand was elected as an MLA from Sheohar in the 2020 Bihar elections on the RJD ticket. He had posted "Hum "thakur" hain" (we are Thakurs) on X in response to Jha's 'Kuan Thakur ka' poem recitation.

Neelam Devi is the wife of another jailed RJD leader Anant Singh. She won the Mokama by-election in October 2022 defeating the BJP candidate. Prior to her, Singh won the Mokama assembly seat four times consecutively since 2005.

However, his disqualification from the assembly following his conviction in an arms recovery case led to his wife entering the electoral politics. The husband-wife duo are Bhumihar by caste, another prominent upper caste in Bihar.

Another interesting entry to the NDA was of Prahlad Yadav, who describes himself as a "dedicated worker" of RJD in his X bio. He has been elected as MLA from Surajgarha five times (once as an Independent and four times on the RJD ticket).