Anant Singh's Electoral Journey: From Prison to Posters in Mokama Ahead of Bihar Election Results

Anant Singh is contesting from Mokama.

New Delhi:

As the Bihar Assembly Election results approach, posters supporting Anant Singh, the Janata Dal United's (JDU) candidate from Mokama, have appeared in his constituency despite his current imprisonment in a murder case.

One prominent poster declares: "Jail ka faatak tootega, hamara sher chootega" (The prison gates will break, our lion will be released), referring to anticipation of Singh's potential release.

The former Bihar MLA, fielded by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JDU, was arrested on November 2 in connection with the murder of Jan Suraaj supporter Dular Chand Yadav.

Yadav, who had transitioned from gangster to politician and was previously affiliated with the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), was killed while campaigning in Mokama for Priyadarshi Piyush, a candidate representing Prashant Kishor's Jan Suraaj Party in the current assembly elections.

According to Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Patna, Kartikeya Sharma, Yadav's post-mortem report indicated death resulting from cardiorespiratory failure due to shock caused by injuries to the heart and lungs from a hard, blunt object.

Authorities have registered a murder case and arrested three individuals - Anant Singh, Manikant Thakur, and Ranjeet Ram.

Anant Singh has a complex political history, having won the Mokama Assembly seat five times despite facing 28 criminal cases. His political career began in 2005, and he successfully retained his seat for the JDU in the 2010 election.

In 2015, Singh left the JDU following Nitish Kumar's alliance with Lalu Prasad Yadav's RJD. Running as an Independent candidate, he defeated the JDU nominee.

Prior to the 2020 assembly election, Singh joined the RJD and secured another victory. However, a 2022 conviction in an arms case cost him his Assembly membership, leading to his wife, Neelam Devi, contesting and winning the subsequent bye-election for Mokama.

Singh has now returned to the JDU fold.

The Mokama Assembly constituency participated in the first phase of voting on November 6. The main contenders for this seat include JDU's Anant Kumar Singh, Jan Suraaj Party's Priyadarshi Piyush, and RJD's Veena Devi.

In the previous Assembly elections, RJD's Anant Kumar Singh emerged victorious with a margin of 35,757 votes over JDU's Rajeev Lochan Narayan Singh, who received 42,964 votes.