Rashtriya Janata Dal - Electoral Performance

Electoral Performance

In the March 1998 national elections, RJD won 17 Lok Sabha seats from Bihar but failed to make significant headway in any other state. Later that year, the party formed an alliance with Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party as an anti-Bharatiya Janata Party secular coalition but the coalition failed in garnering any widespread support.

In the October 1999 elections, RJD fought the election in alliance with Congress but lost 10 Lok Sabha seats including the seat of Lalu Prasad Yadav. In the 2000 state elections, however, it performed unexpectedly well - winning a majority of the seats in the state assembly. Continuing its upswing in electoral fortunes, the party won 21 Lok Sabha seats in the 2004 elections that it fought in alliance with Congress. The pendulum swung back, however, next year and the party had to relinquish power in the 2005 state elections after winning only 75 seats. In the state elections held later that year - as a result of no party being able to form a government - RJD continued its downward slide losing 21 seats.

In the general election of April–May 2009, the RJD had a disastrous result, dropping down to just 4 seats, all of them in Bihar.