All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen has formally asked to join Bihar’s Mahagathbandhan ahead of the 2025 state elections, saying its entry would stop the “division of secular votes.” In a letter dated 2 July, AIMIM’s Bihar president and sole MLA Akhtarul Iman urged Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav to admit the party and said the request had also been conveyed to senior RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav. AIMIM won five seats in the Muslim-dominated Seemanchal belt in the 2020 assembly race, though four of those legislators later defected to the RJD, leaving Iman as the party’s only representative in the 243-member House. Bringing AIMIM into the RJD-led front—which already counts Congress and three Left parties—would mark the Hyderabad-based outfit’s first participation in a major opposition alliance in the state. Reactions were mixed. RJD spokesperson Mrityunjay Tiwari said the final decision rests with Lalu and Tejashwi Yadav, while JD(U) spokesman Neeraj Kumar dismissed the overture, recalling communal violence under previous RJD regimes. Congress MP Tariq Anwar indicated the wider INDIA bloc had not yet discussed the proposal, and BJP allies argued that both AIMIM and the Mahagathbandhan engage in “religion politics.” Seat-sharing talks inside the coalition are already tense, with existing partners staking claims to about 196 of the 243 constituencies. Adding AIMIM could complicate negotiations, but alliance strategists acknowledge the party’s influence in Seemanchal and its potential to consolidate Muslim votes against the ruling National Democratic Alliance.