Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on January 31 dismissed Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s claim, made on January 30, the second day of his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra in the State. Mr. Gandhi, while addressing a public meeting in Purnia in north Bihar, had claimed that it was under pressure from his party that Mr. Kumar had conducted a caste census in Bihar, which the BJP had never wanted. Mr. Kumar said it was “absurd to talk like this and an attempt to take fake credit”.
The CM also asserted that now he would not go “anywhere from here [the BJP]”. He also took on the Opposition INDIA (Indian National Developmental, Inclusive Alliance) bloc and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav on different issues.
“Has he [Rahul Gandhi] forgotten when the caste census happened? I conducted it taking nine political parties together and met the Prime Minister. When I was told indirectly that the Centre cannot do this, I conducted it in the State, but he is taking fake credit, what can I do? Let it be so. But, isase badhkar faltu baat nahi ho sakta (there cannot be anything more absurd that this),” Mr. Kumar told media persons in Patna, when asked about Mr. Gandhi’s remark.
The Bihar government had released the report on October 2, 2023, based on the caste survey it conducted during the previous mahagathbandhan government, comprising the Janata Dal-United (JD-U), the RJD, the Congress, and three Left parties, led by Mr. Kumar.
“I conducted it when they [the BJP] were in Opposition,” Mr. Kumar claimed, speaking to journalists on the sidelines of a government function at Sardar Patel Bhawan in Patna.
Mr. Kumar slammed the non-BJP Opposition INDIA bloc for “doing nothing”. “They were doing nothing. Even seat distribution among allies has not been done yet. They were doing not even a single work,” he said.
“I even was not in support of its name ‘INDIA’. I was urging them to choose another name but they had finalised it,” he added.
“Now I’ve returned to where earlier I was [the BJP] and will not go anywhere from here…ab hum sab din idhare rahenge (now I’ll remain here forever),” he said, adding, “I work for the development of Bihar and will keep doing this.”
Mr. Kumar, on January 28, took another political U-turn, the fifth in a decade, to come out of the mahagathbandhan government and joined hands with the BJP to lead the NDA government in Bihar again. On the same day, he took oath as Chief Minister of the State for the ninth time since March 2000. Earlier, in August 2022, he had severed ties with the BJP and entered into an alliance with the RJD, the Congress and Left parties, while remaining CM all along.
On the summons issued to, and questioning of, RJD chief Lalu Prasad and his younger son Tejashwi Yadav by Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials, Mr. Kumar said the “investigation is underway”.
“Everyone is aware about allegations against him [Mr. Prasad] and I’m not aware about it much. Neither have I asked about it nor has anyone told me anything about this,” he said.
Both Mr. Prasad and Mr. Yadav were questioned for several hours by the ED in Patna on January 29 and 30 in the land-for-job scam case.
On RJD leader and former Deputy Chief Minister Mr. Tejashwi Yadav’s claim that the work done in the last 17 months (during the mahagathbandhan government, from August 2022 to January 28, 2024) could not be done in 17 years (of the NDA regime), Mr. Kumar disagreed.
“My government brought new policies which facilitate ways to provide jobs, And what was there before 2005 [the previous RJD regime] here?…No one even dared to go outside after evening time,” Mr. Kumar said, pointing to the the lawlessness prevailing in Bihar during the previous RJD regime.
Mr. Kumar also said that the new NDA government would seek a trust vote in State Assembly on February 10, and the Budget would be presented on February 12.
Leading an NDA government, Mr Kumar had become CM in November 2005, and since then, he has continued to hold the post, with a brief break of nine months, after his party’s dismal performance in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. He had stepped down from the CM’s post and brought alliance partner Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular)‘s leader Jitan Ram Manjhi in his place but later, he removed him from the post and continued as CM of the State.
