Siwan, Bettiah add to RJD LS kitty

Fighting the elections from jail, Shahabuddin secured a fourth term from Siwan, defeating his nearest JDU rival O.P. Yadav by 1,03,777 votes.

Re-polling was held in over 40 per cent of the booths in the constituency after allegations of violations of the election code by the MPs supporters, were received.

However, the surprise of the Siwan result is the poor performance by the CPIML, which used to finish second.

RJD candidate Raghunath Jha who had quit the JDU a few months before the general elections, wrested the Bettiah seat from three-time BJP MP Madan Prasad Jaiswal, by over 24,000 votes.

Filmmaker Prakash Jha who was in the fray as an independent candidate, finished a distance third. It was after he raised allegations of electoral malpractices, that re-polling was held in a large number of booths in Bettiah.