Patna, October 15:

Major political parties in Bihar barring the Congress are conducting their campaign for the assembly polls from illegally occupied government flats or bungalows.

Unlike in some other states, in Bihar there is no provision to allocate government houses to recognised parties for use as offices. The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the Janata Dal-United (JD-U), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) have their offices in government buildings on Birchand Patel Path, a VIP locality.

While the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) office is in a government bungalow near Patna airport in a high-security zone, the Samajwadi Party office is in an occupied government flat in the legislators’ housing campus on Daroga Rai Path.

The Congress has its state headquarters at Sadaqat Ashram, donated to the party by a Congress leader years ago. Some RJD, BJP and JD-U leaders admitted that it was wrong to run party offices from government houses, some of them allotted to legislators. The house in which the RJD has its headquarters was taken over illegally, official sources say. It was once allotted to a party legislator. After his tenure, the allotment was not renewed.