2004 Indian general election in Bihar

Template:Infobox election In Bihar the RJD leader Lalu Prasad Yadav, husband of the Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi, was able to assemble a broad coalition of anti-NDA parties. It included RJD, Congress, Lok Janshakti, NCP and CPI(M). Congress was sceptical of the coalition, since the party was only allotted four seats by Laloo. The other coalition partners argued that four seats actually reflected the decreasing strength of Congress in the state. Lok Janshakti, a party with strong support amongst Dalit communities, were allotted eight seats. NCP and CPI(M) were allotted one seat each. RJD itself contested 26 seats.

Two large non-NDA parties in the state, CPI and CPI(ML) Liberation, did not join the Lalu-led front but contested individually. CPI(ML)L contested 21 seats and CPI six.

The NDA front consisted of BJP and JD(U). The alliance was threatened at several points, over disagreements on seat-sharing formulas. In the end JD(U) contested 24 seats and BJP 16.

BSP contested all 40 seats and SP 32 on their own, unsuccessfully. Lok Janshakti held sway over Dalit votes and RJD over Yadav votes, thus making it impossible for the Uttar Pradesh-based caste parties to make a breakthrough in the state.

The result was an overwhelming victory for the Laloo-led coalition. It won 29 seats. The rest went to the BJP-JD(U) combine.

Voting in the state was confronted with many irregularities, and repolling was ordered in four constituencies.

Schedule

The schedule of the election was announced by the Election Commission of India on 29 February 2004.

Poll event	Phase
	1	2	3
Date of announcement	29 February 2004
Notification date	24 March 2004	31 March 2004	8 April 2004
Last date for filing nomination	31 March 2004	7 April 2004	15 April 2004
Scrutiny of nomination	2 April 2004	8 April 2004	16 April 2004
Last date for withdrawal of nomination	5 April 2004	10 April 2004	19 April 2004
Date of poll	20 April 2004	26 April 2004	5 May 2004
Date of counting of votes	13 May 2004
No. of constituencies	11	17	12

Parties and alliances

Template:Legend2

colspan="6" Template:Party color cell
United Progressive Alliance
Party		Flag	Symbol	Leader	Seats
Template:Full party name with color	File:RJD Flag.svg	File:Indian Election Symbol Hurricane Lamp.png	Lalu Prasad Yadav	26
Template:Full party name with color	File:Lok Janshakti Party Flag.svg		Ram Vilas Paswan	8
Template:Full party name with color	File:Indian National Congress Flag.svg	File:Hand INC.svg	Ramjatan Sinha	4
Template:Full party name with color	File:Communist Party of India (Marxist) flag.svg	Error creating thumbnail:	Subodh Roy	1
Template:Full party name with color	File:NCP-flag.svg	File:Indian Election Symbol Clock.png	Tariq Anwar	1
Total					40

Template:Legend2

colspan="6" Template:Party color cell
National Democratic Alliance
Party		Flag	Symbol	Leader	Seats
Template:Full party name with color	File:JanataDalUnitedFlag.PNG	File:Indian Election Symbol Arrow.svg	Nitish Kumar	24
Template:Full party name with color	File:BJP flag.svg	File:Lotus flower symbol.svg	Sushil Modi	16
Total					40

Voting and results

Results by alliance or party

Alliance/ Party				Popular vote			Seats
				Votes	%	±pp	Contested	Won	+/−
rowspan="6" Template:Party color cell	UPA	Template:Party color cell	RJD	89,94,821	30.67		26	22	Template:Increase 16
Template:Party color cell		LJP	24,02,603	8.19		8	4	Template:Increase 4
Template:Party color cell		INC	13,15,935	4.49		4	3	Template:Increase 1
Template:Party color cell		NCP	2,86,357	0.98		1	0	Template:Steady
Template:Party color cell		CPI(M)	2,27,298	0.77		1	0	Template:Decrease 1
Total		1,32,27,014	45.10		40	29
rowspan="3" Template:Party color cell	NDA	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	65,58,538	22.36		24	6	Template:Decrease 12
Template:Party color cell		BJP	42,72,195	14.57		16	5	Template:Decrease 7
Total		1,08,30,733	36.93		40	11
Template:Party color cell	BSP			10,50,484	3.58		40	0
Template:Party color cell	CPI(M-L)L			7,05,783	2.41		21	0
Template:Party color cell	SP			6,84,200	2.33		32	0
Template:Party color cell	CPI			3,43,926	1.17		6	0
Template:Party color cell	Others			5,55,749	1.88	Template:Steady	83	0	Template:Steady
Template:Party color cell	IND			19,31,555	6.59		200	0
Total				2,93,29,444	100%	–	462	40	–

Note: In 1999, before Jharkhand was created as a separate state, Bihar had 54 constituencies.

Results by constituency

Constituency		Winner					Runner-up					Margin
		Candidate	Party		Votes	%	Candidate	Party		Votes	%	Votes	%
1	Bagaha (SC)	Kailash Baitha	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	237,989	41.69	Hiralal Ram	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	172,614	30.24	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|65,375	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|11.45
2	Bettiah	Raghunath Jha	Template:Party color cell	RJD	211,590	37.13	Madan Prasad Jaiswal	Template:Party color cell	BJP	186,919	32.80	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|24,671	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4.33
3	Motihari	Akhilesh Prasad Singh	Template:Party color cell	RJD	348,596	51.33	Radha Mohan Singh	Template:Party color cell	BJP	251,572	37.05	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|97,024	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|14.29
4	Gopalganj	Sadhu Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	336,016	48.38	Prabhu Dayal Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	143,097	20.60	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|192,919	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|27.78
5	Siwan	Mohammad Shahabuddin	Template:Party color cell	RJD	317,511	49.80	Om Prakash Yadav	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	213,933	33.56	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|103,578	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|16.25
6	Maharajganj	Prabhunath Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	283,506	42.67	Jitendra Swami	Template:Party color cell	RJD	237,041	35.68	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|46,465	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|6.99
7	Chapra	Lalu Prasad Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	228,882	51.31	Rajiv Pratap Rudy	Template:Party color cell	BJP	168,459	37.76	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|60,423	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|13.54
8	Hajipur (SC)	Ram Vilas Paswan	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	477,495	61.72	Chhedi Paswan	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	239,694	30.98	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|237,801	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|30.74
9	Vaishali	Raghuvansh Prasad Singh	Template:Party color cell	RJD	361,503	48.28	Vijay Kumar Shukla	Template:Party color cell	IND	255,568	34.13	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|105,935	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|14.15
10	Muzaffarpur	George Fernandes	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	370,127	47.20	Bhagwan Lal Sahani	Template:Party color cell	RJD	360,434	45.97	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|9,693	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|1.24
11	Sitamarhi	Sitaram Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	326,165	47.21	Nawal Kishore Rai	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	228,160	33.03	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|98,005	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|14.19
12	Sheohar	Sitaram Singh	Template:Party color cell	RJD	303,243	45.50	Md Anwarul Haque	Template:Party color cell	BJP	229,360	34.42	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|73,883	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|11.09
13	Madhubani	Shakeel Ahmad	Template:Party color cell	INC	328,182	47.21	Hukum Deo Narayan Yadav	Template:Party color cell	BJP	241,103	34.68	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|87,079	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|12.53
14	Jhanjharpur	Devendra Prasad Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	323,400	45.92	Jagannath Mishra	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	310,565	44.10	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|12,835	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|1.82
15	Darbhanga	Mohammad Ali Ashraf Fatmi	Template:Party color cell	RJD	427,672	56.08	Kirti Azad	Template:Party color cell	BJP	284,209	37.27	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|143,463	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|18.81
16	Rosera (SC)	Ram Chandra Paswan	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	394,240	55.23	Dasai Chowdhary	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	255,829	35.84	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|138,411	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|19.39
17	Samastipur	Alok Kumar Mehta	Template:Party color cell	RJD	437,457	50.59	Ram Chandra Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	310,674	35.93	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|126,783	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|14.66
18	Barh	Vijay Krishna	Template:Party color cell	RJD	426,856	49.40	Nitish Kumar	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	389,168	45.04	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|37,688	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4.36
19	Balia	Suraj Singh	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	233,869	36.98	Shatrughna Prasad Singh	Template:Party color cell	CPI	157,642	24.93	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|76,227	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|12.05
20	Saharsa	Ranjeet Ranjan	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	350,426	47.47	Dinesh Chandra Yadav	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	319,639	43.30	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|30,787	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4.17
21	Madhepura	Lalu Prasad Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	344,301	49.49	Sharad Yadav	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	274,314	39.43	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|69,987	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|10.06
22	Araria (SC)	Sukdeo Paswan	Template:Party color cell	BJP	216,677	33.21	Ramjidas Rishidev	Template:Party color cell	SP	188,933	28.96	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|27,744	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4.25
23	Kishanganj	Mohammed Taslimuddin	Template:Party color cell	RJD	420,331	51.68	Syed Shahnawaz Hussain	Template:Party color cell	BJP	259,834	31.95	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|160,497	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|19.73
24	Purnea	Uday Singh	Template:Party color cell	BJP	244,426	34.47	Pappu Yadav	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	231,543	32.66	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|12,883	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|1.82
25	Katihar	Nikhil Kumar Choudhary	Template:Party color cell	BJP	288,922	41.01	Tariq Anwar	Template:Party color cell	NCP	286,357	40.65	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|2,565	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|0.36
26	Banka	Giridhari Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	339,880	47.61	Digvijay Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	335,211	46.96	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4,669	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|0.65
27	Bhagalpur	Sushil Kumar Modi	Template:Party color cell	BJP	345,151	45.58	Subodh Ray	Template:Party color cell	CPI(M)	227,298	30.01	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|117,853	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|15.56
28	Khagaria	Rabindra Kumar Rana	Template:Party color cell	RJD	322,440	47.70	Renu Kushawaha	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	255,317	37.77	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|67,123	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|9.93
29	Monghyr	Jay Prakash Narayan Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	453,286	54.08	Monazir Hassan	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	337,359	40.25	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|115,927	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|13.83
30	Begusarai	Rajiv Ranjan Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	301,562	44.43	Krishna Sahi	Template:Party color cell	INC	281,071	41.42	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|20,491	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|3.02
31	Nalanda	Nitish Kumar	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	471,310	52.65	Dr. Kumar Pushpanjay	Template:Party color cell	LJNSP	368,914	41.21	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|102,396	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|11.44
32	Patna	Ram Kripal Yadav	Template:Party color cell	RJD	433,853	48.12	C. P. Thakur	Template:Party color cell	BJP	395,291	43.84	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|38,562	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|4.28
33	Arrah	Kanti Singh	Template:Party color cell	RJD	299,422	38.03	Ram Naresh Ram	Template:Party color cell	CPI(ML)	149,679	19.01	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|149,743	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|19.02
34	Buxar	Lalmuni Chaubey	Template:Party color cell	BJP	205,980	31.73	Dadan Singh	Template:Party color cell	IND	151,114	23.28	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|54,866	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|8.45
35	Sasaram (SC)	Meira Kumar	Template:Party color cell	INC	416,673	59.76	Muni Lall	Template:Party color cell	BJP	158,411	22.72	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|258,262	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|37.04
36	Bikramganj	Ajit Kumar Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	305,392	41.61	Ram Prasad Kushwaha	Template:Party color cell	RJD	246,591	33.60	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|58,801	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|8.01
37	Aurangabad	Nikhil Kumar	Template:Party color cell	INC	290,009	37.80	Sushil Kumar Singh	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	282,549	36.83	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|7,460	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|0.97
38	Jahanabad	Ganesh Prasad Singh	Template:Party color cell	RJD	400,063	46.31	Arun Kumar	Template:Party color cell	JD(U)	353,625	40.94	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|46,438	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|5.38
39	Nawada (SC)	Virchandra Paswan	Template:Party color cell	RJD	489,992	48.51	Sanjay Paswan	Template:Party color cell	BJP	433,986	42.97	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|56,006	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|5.54
40	Gaya (SC)	Rajesh Kumar Manjhi	Template:Party color cell	RJD	464,829	52.62	Balbir Chand	Template:Party color cell	BJP	361,895	40.97	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|102,934	style="background:Template:Party color ; color:white;"|11.65

Post-election Union Council of Ministers from Bihar

#	Name	Constituency	Designation	Department	From	To	Party
1	Lalu Prasad Yadav	Chapra	Cabinet Minister	Railways	23 May 2004	22 May 2009	Template:Party name with color
2	Ram Vilas Paswan	Hajipur (SC)		Chemicals and Fertilizers Steel			Template:Party name with color
3	Raghuvansh Prasad Singh	Vaishali		Rural Development			Template:Party name with color
4	Meira Kumar	Sasaram (SC)		Social Justice and Empowerment			Template:Party name with color
5	Shakeel Ahmad	Madhubani	Minister of State	Communications and Information Technology Home Affairs
6	Akhilesh Prasad Singh	Motihari		Agriculture Food and Civil Supplies, Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution			Template:Party name with color
7	Mohammed Taslimuddin	Kishanganj		Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises (Until 25 May 2004); Agriculture; Food and Civil Supplies
8	Jay Prakash Narayan Yadav	Munger		Water Resources
9	Mohammad Ali Ashraf Fatmi	Darbhanga		Human Resource Development
10	Kanti Singh	Arrah		Human Resource Development Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises Tourism Culture
11	Raghunath Jha	Bettiah		Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises	6 April 2008	22 May 2009
12	Prem Chand Gupta	Rajya Sabha (Bihar)	MoS(I/C)	Ministry of Company Affairs (renamed Corporate Affairs in May 2007)	23 May 2004	22 May 2009

Assembly segments wise lead of Parties

Party				Assembly segments
rowspan="6" Template:Party color cell	UPA	bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	RJD	114
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		LJP	28
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		INC	17
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		NCP	4
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		CPI(M)	0
Total		163
rowspan="3" Template:Party color cell	NDA	bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	JD(U)	45
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		BJP	28
Total		73
rowspan="6" Template:Party color cell	Others	bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	SP	3
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		BSP	1
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		CPI(ML)L	1
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		CPI	1
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|		Independent	1
Total		7
Total				243

External links

• Thisismyindia – Election results 2005