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All 318 seats in the Bihar Legislative Assembly 160 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Registered | 27,743,190 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Turnout | 51.51% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Elections to the Bihar Legislative Assembly were held in February 1967, to elect members of the 318 constituencies in Bihar, India. The Indian National Congress won the most seats as well as the popular vote, but Mahamaya Prasad Sinha of the Jana Kranti Dal was appointed as the Chief Minister of Bihar. [1] No single party had won a majority of seats, [2]
Parties like Samyukt Socialist Party, Jan Sangh, CPI, Jan Kranti Dal and Praja Socialist together formed the government. Although the second largest party after Congress was the Samyukt Socialist Party and its leader Karpoori Thakur had a stake in the post of Chief Minister, but other parties were not ready.In such a situation, all the parties agreed on the name of Mahamaya Prasad Sinha of Jan Kranti Dal(of Kamakhya Narain Singh), who became the Chief Minister of Bihar in March 1967, while Karpoori Thakur became the Deputy Chief Minister. However, the government couldn't last even for a year. [3]
Opposition to the caste composition of the ministry led to some members of the samyukt socialist party, provoked by Health minister BP Mandal(who was forced to resign by Ram Manohar Lohia), join hands with the congress to form new government headed by first backward chief minister BP Mandal, which lasted just 50 days. [4]
However, there was a tussle going on within the Congress on the issue of supporting the Mandal government. Angered by this decision of the party, 17 MLAs rebelled under the leadership of former Chief Minister Binodanand Jha, leader of the anti-KB Sahay group. Formed a separate faction in the name of Loktrantik Congress and withdrew support from the Mandal government. Only one month old BP Mandal government had to resign and in the new manipulation, MLA of this Loktrantik Congress camp, Bhola Paswan Shastri became first Dalit chief minister with the help of opposition MLAs. Even his ministry lasted for just 4 months [4]
The weakening of previously dominant congress party, rising aspirations of backward classes(forward-backward tussle) and individual greed of leaders was the main reasons for these short lived govertments. [5]
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| Party | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | |
| Indian National Congress | 4,479,460 | 33.09 | 128 |  57 | |
| Samyukta Socialist Party | 2,385,961 | 17.62 | 68 | New | |
| Bharatiya Jana Sangh | 1,410,722 | 10.42 | 26 |  23 | |
| Praja Socialist Party | 942,889 | 6.96 | 18 | 11 | |
| Communist Party of India | 935,977 | 6.91 | 24 | 12 | |
| Jan Kranti Dal | 451,412 | 3.33 | 13 | New | |
| Swatantra Party | 315,184 | 2.33 | 3 | 47 | |
| Communist Party of India (Marxist) | 173,656 | 1.28 | 4 | New | |
| Republican Party of India | 23,893 | 0.18 | 1 | New | |
| Independents | 2,419,469 | 17.87 | 33 | 21 | |
| Total | 13,538,623 | 100.00 | 318 | 0 | |
| Valid votes | 13,538,623 | 73.37 | |||
| Invalid/blank votes | 4,914,436 | 26.63 | |||
| Total votes | 18,453,059 | 100.00 | |||
| Registered voters/turnout | 27,743,190 | 66.51 | |||
| Source: ECI [6] | |||||
In Bihar state, the voters failed to give a clear mandate to any single party to govern...
