People want to see me everywhere…BJP should have given me more seats: Jitan Ram Manjhi

Such is his popularity among the poor, the Mahadalit leader said, that ally Ram Vilas Paswan, whose clout among Dalit voters he had questioned some time ago, had to “request” him to address a rally by telephone in Alauli, where Paswan’s brother Pashupati Paras is contesting.

Manjhi predicted that the strike rate of his party, HAM, would be better than that of all other NDA constituents. He said it would have won over 35 seats had it been given 40 to contest, and only time would tell if the BJP-led coalition would regret the decision of allotting HAM only 21 seats.

“My strike rate will be better than that of any other party, including BJP,” he said. “The reason is that there is a strong sentiment in my support among the poor for the work I had started and which was stopped by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Now they want to avenge it.”

Asked if he saw himself as the most popular NDA leader except for top BJP campaigners such as Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he said, “Of course… people want to see my face everywhere.” Of the 40 or 45 rallies he has addressed so far, only 10 or 12 were for his party’s nominees, he noted.

“Big leaders are coming, so are actors,” Manjhi said. “As far as I am concerned, there is a lot of demand for me among the poor, which even they (BJP and allies) acknowledge.” Muslims, he said, will not vote for the BJP but they will for his candidates because of the work he did for them.

Asked if the NDA will regret giving him only 21 seats, he said, “Only time will tell. As of now, we are working on winning as many seats as possible.”

He mocked the grand alliance, saying it has no other face than that of Nitish Kumar. “Where there is no tree, people call a cactus a tree,” he said, and described Nitish as a “one-eyed man” in a crowd of blind people.