RJD to contest Assam Assembly polls; Plans to campaign against against the BJP in poll-bound states

Guwahati: Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) will contest the upcoming Assam Assembly polls in alliance with "like-minded" parties, said RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav on Saturday. Yadav said he has already spoken to Congress and will hold talks with the AIUDF later in the day to formalise the alliance.

"We are talking to like-minded parties," he told during a press conference.

Yadav said apart from the Congress and AIUDF, the RJD is in touch with other smaller parties. According to reports the idea was to talk to all the anti-CAA parties.

The Centre's Citizenship Amendment Act had sparked a furore across the state sections of which view the new legislation as legitimising decades of illegal immigration suffered by Assam.

"There are around five per cent Hindi-speaking people from Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh.

We have considerable number of such people in 11 seats, but we'll contest only where chances of winning are high," Yadav said.

Meanwhile, some media reports said RJD's arch rival from Bihar, the Janata Dal United, too, may contest the Assam polls this time. The chances, however, are that it will go solo.

However, the RJD is not restricting itself. "Not only Assam, we will go to Bengal, Kerala, and other states," Mr Yadav said on Saturday, reports NDTV.

"Our party used to be a national party, now we want to expand it." he added

The senior RJD leader also said he would travel to other poll-bound states West Bengal, Kerala and Puducherry to campaign against the BJP and its allies.

Of the 126 seats in the Assam assembly, 47 will go to polls on March 27 in the first phase, 39 on April 1, and 40 on April 6. Counting for all the three phases will take place on May 2. The ruling BJP is looking to retain power even as the opposition Congress-led combine eyes change