PATNA, Nov. 17 -- Bihar elections are over, and the results have been accordant to the established electoral arithmetic in the state for the last five state elections, with alliance having a more broader voter base acquiring the higher number of winners and not the individual might of parties as displayed by their vote share. "A glaring example of this the fluctuating fortunes RJD despite remaining the largest party in terms of vote share in three out of last five Assembly elections and the combined might of the NDA, which covers all the gaps through BJP's booth-level planning and perseverance, to always triumph, barring 2015 when JD(U) went with the RJD," said former director of AN Sinha Institute of Social Studies DM Diwakar. He said that the main difference remained the cumulative effect of the alliance and it went overwhelmingly in favour of the NDA due to the simple reason that the Opposition alliance never looked like one and there were fissures also in the Lalu family, with Tej Pratap Yadav fielding candidates on 34 seats, and voices of discontent emerging at regular intervals. "Bihar's electoral arithmetic is such since 2005 that Nitish remains the differentiator and BJP realised it, while the INDIA bloc could not hold on to him. NDA parties -- big or small -- bring something to the table, are able to get votes transferred and the cumulative effect due to BJP's micro management is overwhelming, as it proved in 2010 and 2025. Any change in alliance has upset the arithmetic. Besides, Nitish has altered the equation by making women a separate vote bank," he added. Social analyst Prof NK Choudhary said that just as RJD has fumbled in terms of seats in 2025 despite getting the largest vote share of 23% as an individual party, BJP had struggled in 2015, when it struggled to get 53 seats at the peak of Narendra Modi wave despite having the highest 25% vote share against the combined strength of RJD and JD(U). "The electoral arithmetic of Bihar has not changed much, as the statistics suggest. Even in 2010, when NDA scripted the biggest landslide victory, RJD had got 18.8% votes, but was relegated to just 22 seats. This time the RJD has got 25, as the cumulative effect of its alliance partners pulled it down, while it pulled the LJP-R up despite slight dip in vote share due to the cumulative effect of the NDA. In the 2020 election, LJP-R had suffered, but it also made the JD(U) suffer," he added. He said the individual vote share of parties are determined by a number of factors, the prime being the number of seats it contests. "Similarly, the number of seats a party wins in an alliance may be attributed to how the vote transfer happens and how the other constituents perform. In NDA, the cohesion and early start sent the right message, which could not happen in the Opposition at any stage," he added. He said that Tejashwi's party ending up runners-up on 110 seats out of the 143 it contested was a pointer that it was the main opponent to the NDA in terms of votes, but could manage just 25 seats due to formidable electoral arithmetic of the NDA. Bihar's politics has remained predominantly triangular since 2005 and things had not changed, with none of the three mainstream parties -- BJP, JD(U) and the RJD -- in a Opposition to get to the magic figure on its own. "The results, according to experts, is a clear indication of how ground work, combined strength and smart strategy can work. And Nitish Kumar remains as relevant today as he was in 2005 both due to his work and absence of any leader in any party to match his aura," he added. Nitish Kumar had on his own led NDA to a bigger landslide in 2010, when JD(U) had won 115 seats and BJP 91, while this time the seat positions reversed with the BJP emerging as the slightly bigger party, but the impact remained the same. The one common thread in both 2010 and 2025 is the unmatched electoral arithmetic favouring the NDA. CPI-ML leader Deepankar Bhattacharya also said that it was an irony of the system that there was no coorelation between the votes percentage and seats. "We got almost the same number of around 1.4 million votes this time, which comes to around 3%, but we got just one seat, while it was much higher last time with 12 seats. The results certainly look unnatural and unexpected. It was also abnormal due to the money play even during election by the ruling dispensation," he said, while talking to media persons....