In Graphics | Nitish Kumar sails through floor test in Bihar. Here’s how it works

After switching sides, re-enforcing his moniker of ‘Paltu Ram’, Nitish Kumar, who had called for a trust vote on the floor of the Assembly, has sailed through. The chief minister won the floor test with a 130-0 vote as the Opposition, comprising of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Congress and the Left Front, staged a walkout from the Assembly. Notably, three Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MLAs (Prahlad Yadav, Neelam Devi and Chetan Anand) switched over to the NDA bloc. In a 243-member Assembly, where the majority mark is 122, the Mahagathbandhan of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the Congress, CPI(ML) Liberation, CPI and CPI(M) have 114 seats while the JD(U)-BJP combine have the support of 128 MLAs, six more than the halfway mark. But what is a trust vote and how does it work? We explain it all.