National Democratic Alliance on Saturday evening tried to wean away Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan from the United Progressive Alliance and sought the support of his 29 legislators.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA even went to the extent of suggesting that Paswan could be granted the chief minister's post.

Paswan stuck to his stand that he would not support either the Rashtriya Janata Dal or the NDA combine to form the next government in the state.

However, in an attempt to keep the anti-Lalu and anti-BJP forces together, he called on Communist Party of India-Marxist Leninist for their support which has 7 MLAs on Saturday.

A team of NDA leaders including BJP vice-president Sushil Kumar Modi, state president Gopal Narain Singh and Janata Dal-United state president Bijendra Prasad Yadav met Governor Buta Singh.

Modi requested him not to invite the Rashtriya Janata Dal to form the next government as the latter lacked a simple majority in the House of 243.

Earlier, on Saturday morning, caretaker Chief Minister Rabri Devi accompanied by her husband and Railway Minister Lalu Prasad, met Buta Singh and staked claim to form the next government.

Lalu said the RJD was the single largest party with 75 seats.

He said it also had the support of 10 Congress MLAs, three Nationalist Congress Party , three Communist Party of India, one Communist Party of India (Marxist) , two Bahujan Samaj Party and a majority of 17 independents MLAs.
However, NDA leaders said the BJP with 37 seats, the JD-U with 55 seats and six independents were against the RJD to form government.

WITH PTI INPUTS.

Earlier Reports

Rabri to stake claim to form govt

Paswan ridicules RJD for staking claim