Live updates: Piyush Goyal gets additional charge of Food Ministry

This relaxation will remain in force till 20th October, the last date of nomination for phase 3 of Bihar elections

After Pandey failed to figure in the list of assembly poll candidates, there was a faint possibility that the newly indcuted member might be fielded from the parliamentary constituency, but all hopes dashed, as the ruling JD(U) announced Kumar's name as its bypoll candidate on Wednesday. Kumar is the son of JD(U) MP Baidyanath Mahto, whose untimely death necessitated the bypolls. Speculation was also rife that Pandey, who quit his job to join the JD(U), might be fielded from Buxar, his hometown, or Shahpur, but the two seats went to the BJP, under the NDA seat-sharing arrangement.

As the party released its first list of candidates, its president Chirag Paswan again gave a call to defeat the JD(U), claiming that a vote for the state's ruling party will amount to "destroying" Bihar. All these 42 seats are among the 71 constituencies going to polls in the first phase on October 28, the LJP said. As expected, the LJP has fielded Rajendra Singh and Usha Vidyarthi, two senior Bihar BJP leaders who joined it recently, from Dinara and Paliganj respectively.

Under the seat-sharing arrangement of the NDA, the JD (U) has got 122 out of the total 243 constituencies in the state and it will be contesting 115, leaving aside seven for ex-chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) which has returned to the NDA.The party has announced its nominees for all 115 seats, of whom 11 are Muslims. This figure of close to 10 per cent is less than commensurate with their population in the state where they comprise more than 15 per cent of the populace.Nonetheless, with a steady decline in the community's electoral representation over the decades, the JD(U) may end up claiming that it scored better than most on this count.