BJP-led alliance will form Assam govt with at least 85 MLAs, claims Ranjeet Dass

GUWAHATI:  A day after the exit polls predicted a possible BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), or Mitrajot, government in Assam after the May 2 counting, the BJP today claimed its alliance would win not less than 85 seats in the 126-member Assam assembly.

Reacting to exit polls, BJP state president Ranjeet Kr Dass today said his party along would win 70 seats, while the Asom Gana Parishad would win eight and the United People’s Front-Liberal (UPPL) would have to contend with five. The UPPL had contested in eight seats out of 12 in Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR).

He, however, added that the party assessment gives an added two seats in favour of the alliance.

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“We would neither like to accept the exit poll predictions, nor reject them. It’s their assessment. But, our assessment is based on direct feedback from our 4.6 lakh grassroots workers,” Dass said.

In the exit polls, Republic-CNX predicts NDA will win 74 to 84 seats, ABP-Cvoter predicts 58 to 71 seats, India Today-Axis predicts 75 to 85 seats, Times Now says it will be 65 and Today’s Chanakya predicts 61-79 seats. InsideNE, the only news organisation to conduct field survey exit poll in Assam, predicts 57 to 67 seats in favour of the Mitrajot.

Admitting that the NDA would lose out in the Barak Valley, Dass said: “Our expectation was to win at least 12 seats in the Barak Valley. But, we now have doubts in some of the seats. However, we will certainly win seven seats from there. We had won eight from the valley in the 2016 elections.”

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The BJP was expecting to capitalise on the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 in the Bengali-dominated Barak Valley, which, however, boomeranged.

Dass claimed that the NDA was going to win at least seven more seats in Upper Assam “because the people of Upper Assam refused to accept the unholy alliance of the Congress and the AIUDF (All India United Democratic Front)”.

He claimed the BJP and its allies would win in traditional Congress bastions of Titabor, Nazira, Mariani, Sivasagar, Golaghat, Sarupathar and Doomdooma only because of the Congress-AIUDF alliance that the people rejected.

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Besides, the BJP leader claimed that four-time MLA and minister Chandan Brahma of Bodoland People’s Front (BPF) of Congress Mahajot would bite the dust against NDA ally UPPL candidate Jayanta Basumatary in Sidli.

He, however, refused to comment on the possible fate of former student leader Lawrence Ishlary of UPPL against veteran BPF stalwart Pramila Rani Brahma in Kokrajhar East.