Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has convened a meeting of Janata Dal-United MLAs and MPs on Tuesday to discuss the scenario that has emerged following the exit of former national president R C P Singh, party chief Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan said on Monday.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar seems intent on mending fences with estranged former colleagues as part of the spadework for posing a credible challenge to the Bharatiya Janata Party's national hegemony.
Sounding confident of winning the trust vote on February 20, Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi said he would enter the ring as a "wrestler" without bothering about his win or loss.
Party believes Nitish-Lalu alliance beatable, but wary of self goals.
Kumar is reported to have made the Rajya Sabha remark during an informal chat with some journalists who had asked him about his recent tour of areas falling under the now abolished Barh Lok Sabha constituency which he had represented many times.
Facing criticism over his appointment as Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad's son Tejaswi Yadav on Monday promised to take the state forward on the path of development and asserted that he would have a zero tolerance approach towards corruption.
Dominic Xavier wonders whether Bihari women will remember what Nitish Kumar has done for them or whether electorate amnesia will set in.
Arvind Kejriwal warned the media that "very big forces" would try and break the INDIA alliance by showing that there was a lot of acrimony among them.
'The JD-U is my party and of thousands of leaders and workers.' 'It is certainly not Nitish Kumar's party.'
Today, a friendship forged by common ideals behind prison walls has become a transactional understanding, notes Aditi Phadnis.
It also cautioned that if the legislation is passed, the "two crutches" on which the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government is running at the Centre would not be able to escape responsibility.
A meeting of Opposition parties, organised by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, will be held in Patna on June 23, his deputy Tejashwi Yadav said on Wednesday.
Anti-incumbency against Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's 15-year-old rule in Bihar is stronger that what Lalu Prasad Yadav-led RJD regime faced in 2005, LJP president Chirag Paswan said on Monday, asserting that he walked out of the ruling alliance in the state so as not to have any 'guilt' of playing a role in continuation of the current dispensation.
Veteran Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Awadh Bihari Chaudhary was on Friday unanimously elected as speaker of the Bihar legislative assembly.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi came under scathing attack from the Grand Secular Alliance on Sunday in poll-bound Bihar with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad and Congress President Sonia Gandhi accusing him of "insulting" the state and failing to deliver on any of his promises.
The Congress also asserted that the opposition INDIA bloc had been formed for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections at the national level and was not state specific.
Shatrughan Sinha, MP and senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader, on Saturday met Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who he described as "guardian of the state", generating speculation in political circles which he downplayed.
Recalling his association with Jaitley, the CM said that "I had very close association with Arun Jailey ji since 1998 when I got the opportunity to work in Atal Bihari Vajpayee government... I am deeply hurt with passing away of Arun Jaitley ji."
The bodies of the last four of the trapped labourers were pulled out from the site of the avalanche-hit Border Roads Organisation (BRO) camp in Chamoli on Sunday, taking the death toll to eight as authorities ended the nearly 60-hour rescue operation.
Wait for a while before he does another somersault... But one thing is reasonably certain -- the twice betrayed BJP may not embrace him again, predicts Virendra Kapoor.
The percentage of households who live on less than Rs 6,000 a month or less than Rs 200 a day among the Scheduled tribe households (42.91 per cent) was almost the same as among scheduled caste households (42.78 per cent).
"Between 1990 and 2005, only 95,000 people were given jobs. In our administration, over 6 lakh jobs were given and besides this many others were enrolled in other services," Nitish Kumar said.
Moreover, there have also been speculations that while entering into an alliance in August last year, a "deal" was struck whereby Nitish Kumar would give up his chair for his deputy who in turn would back him for the top job in national politics.
Expressing displeasure over the attack on his cabinet colleague Nitin Nabin by miscreants in neighbouring Jharkhand amid the protests, Kumar on Monday asserted that 'the responsibility of maintaining peace and communal harmony rests with the state government'.
Nitish also reiterated that he was "not a claimant" for the top post.
The JD-U leader was seen sitting with Tej Pratap and Tejashwi Yadav, the sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav.
The full bench of the Election Commission will meet on August 25 in New Delhi after the return of Chief Election Commissioner S Nasim Zaidi to discuss the Bihar assembly polls.
The National Democratic Alliance in Bihar which so far had BJP, JD-U and the LJP as its constituents will now have another dalit-centric party HAM as a member.
'The main characteristic of Bihar politics is that it has always affected Delhi.'
Efforts to forge unity in the opposition ranks gained momentum on Monday with the Congress asserting that a 'vast majority' of non-Bharatiya Janata Party outfits will meet soon, after Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar met its president Mallikarjun Kharge and senior leader Rahul Gandhi.
Post Nitish's exit, 17 parties plan to meet on Friday to formulate their future course of action. Congress president Sonia Gandhi has invited Sharad Yadav to join them, reports Archis Mohan.
Kumar had also made it clear that he was in the process of uniting the non-BJP leaders.
Leaders of several like-minded opposition parties are likely to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Karnataka chief minister-designate Siddaramaiah and deputy chief minister D K Shivakumar on Saturday in Bengaluru.
A political activist in Bihar on Thursday put up a poster announcing his resignation from 'all posts in the Bharatiya Janata Party' in protest against the ethnic strife in Manipur.
The cabinet of the new government led by Rekha Gupta balances representation of all major communities that propelled the Bharatiya Janata Party to power in Delhi with a massive majority after over 26 years.
The Jharkhand high court on Friday deferred till November 27 Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad's bail plea hearing in a fodder scam case related to Dumka treasury, after the Central Bureau of Investigation sought more time to file a written reply in the matter.
'At the right time, people of Bihar will give a befitting response to him and the one who makes him dance to his tunes, the prime minister'
The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar came under fresh attack on Monday from state Bharatiya Janata Party president Sanjay Jaiswal whose party seems annoyed with junior ally Janata Dal-United's shrill demands for special assistance from the Centre.
'Nitish Kumar has no vision for the people of the state. He also had no justifiable reason for ditching us and going back to the BJP-led NDA'
The assembly secretariat released the business agenda of the House for Monday, when the budget session will commence, with a customary address by the Governor to members of the bicameral legislature.
