'War rooms and high alert': Bihar political parties keep hawk's eye on polls

Patna, Nov 11 (IANS) With voter turnout in the second and final phase of the Bihar Assembly Elections 2025 reaching an impressive 60.40 per cent by 3 PM, all major political parties remain on high alert, closely monitoring developments from their respective election war rooms.

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar visited the Janata Dal (United) headquarters in Patna to review the situation and directed party officials to keep a close watch on every development from the ground, on Tuesday.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has also set up an extensive monitoring network, receiving real-time feedback from its booth-level agents across the state.

“We have appointed over 92,000 booth-level agents in Bihar who have been active in both phases of polling. BJP has the highest number of booth-level representatives, with almost one agent per polling booth,” Radhika Raman, convener of the Bihar BJP Election Cell, told IANS.

“Our agents are not only working for the BJP but also assisting alliance partners -- JD(U), LJP(RV), HAM, and RLM -- on the ground. They are tasked with tracking voter turnout trends and sending timely updates to the state election cell,” Raman added.

The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has also established a centralised election war room at its Patna headquarters.

According to party officials, RJD’s 47,000 booth-level agents are in constant touch with local representatives and monitoring developments at polling stations throughout the day.

RJD has lodged the highest number of complaints before the Election Commission of India (ECI).

The party has highlighted the incident of Sarairanjan in Samastipur and Siwan when the slips of VVPAT were found abandoned on the roads. These booth-level agents have played a crucial role in identifying the irregularities and passing them to the headquarters with proof.

Both alliances -- the NDA and the Grand Alliance -- are maintaining close coordination and real-time communication networks to assess polling trends as voting continues across 20 districts of Bihar.

--IANS

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