How polls will be held in Bihar amid pandemic, asks Shiv Sena's Sanjay Raut

Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut on Saturday sought to know how elections would be conducted in Bihar amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Assembly elections will be held in Bihar in three phases -- October 28, November 3 and 7.

Speaking to reporters here, Raut said though the poll dates were duly announced as the term of the Bihar assembly is about to end, "the question is, has COVID-19 ended".

"How will elections be held in such atmosphere? The country must know. How will the election campaign and rallies be held? Voting can not be online. You have to stand ina queue," the Rajya Sabha member said.

As people are not venturing out due to the fear of the pandemic, voting percentage should not come down, he added.

To the question whether the newly passed farm bills would be a poll issue, Raut said Bihar is important in national politics, and elections should be fought on the issues of development, law and order, and governance.

"If these issues are exhausted, some can be shipped from Mumbai," he said, in an apparent dig at parties in the northern state making actor Sushant Singh Rajput's alleged suicide a political issue.