A day after his landslide victory in the Bihar assembly polls, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was on Thursday elected as the leader of the National Democratic Alliance legislature party in the 15th Bihar assembly.
The war of words between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar escalated on Monday with the latter tweeting that "50 lakh people" from Bihar would send their DNA samples for testing to the prime minister.
The governor accepted Kumar's resignation, and asked him to continue as caretaker CM till a new government is formed, they said.
In a ghastly incident that has sent shock waves across Bihar, former state minister Mukesh Sahni's 70-year-old father was found stabbed to death at his native home in Darbhanga district, a top police officer said.
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Kumar also asserted that his efforts should reap benefits for the younger generation, "for people like (his deputy) Tejashwi Yadav".
Villagers suggested that heavy rainfall over the preceding days may have contributed to the collapse, with a surge in Gandaki river potentially weakening the bridge's structure.
Modi, one of the tallest leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Bihar, had been missing from action for quite some time and was conspicuous by his absence when Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman released the party's manifesto earlier in the day.
Kumar, who chose not to react when the 31-year-old Rashtriya Janata Dal leader made a series of personal attacks and allegations in his nearly an hour-long speech, erupted in anger when the latter sought to interject during a statement made by Janata Dal-United leader and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary.
'Some locals suggested that a heated argument between a group of kanwariyas and flower sellers outside the temple may have triggered the incident'
Ajit Pawar, who heads the Nationalist Congress Party, which is in an alliance with pro-Hindutva BJP and the Shiv Sena, noted Chief Ministers Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal), Chandrababu Naidu (Andhra Pradesh) and Nitish Kumar (Bihar) -- all secular politicians -- aligned with the BJP for the sake of development of their respective states.
Members of allies, the Bharatiya Janata Party and Lok Janshakti Party, were left out from the cabinet expansion.
'Muslims in Bihar under Nitishji's rule are safest than anywhere else.'
Altogether 77 people have been arrested in connection with the communal violence that erupted in Bihar Sharif town in Nalanda district during the Ram Navami festivities, police said on Sunday.
Priya, who belongs to Darbhanga but lives in London, announced the same in full-page advertisements which appeared in several Hindi and English newspapers in Bihar on Sunday.
Names of eight-term MLA from Gaya town Prem Kumar and that of Kameshwar Choupal, a Dalit MLC who had laid the foundation stone for the temple at Ayodhya in the 1990s, are also doing the rounds for the post in the political circles.
The RJD wrote on its X handle, in Hindi, "Just see how Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is pulling towards himself a woman in an objectionable manner with Home Minister Amit Shah looking on".
Addressing a poll rally in Katihar, the former Congress president criticised the NDA government over demonetisation, migrant crisis, GST, handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the three new farm laws.
Chaudhary alleged that the BJP "hates Bihar" after having lost power in the state, which is "back in the centre-stage of national politics" since the opposition meeting hosted in Patna by Nitish Kumar.
JMM leader Hemant Soren was sworn in as the 14th chief minister of Jharkhand in a grand ceremony in Ranchi, amid the presence of a galaxy of INDIA bloc leaders. This is Soren's fourth stint as chief minister. The JMM-led alliance won a majority in the recent assembly polls, securing 56 seats in the 81-member assembly.
The BJP and JDU leaders claimed that Prasad insulted women in the state with his comment.
The poll results give the ruling Janata Dal-United-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance 170 seats in the 243-member house. The Laloo Prasad Yadav-Ram Vilas Paswan alliance is set to be reduced to 34 seats, according to the predictions.
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The rumours have primarily been about the impending resignation of JD-U national president Rajiv Ranjan Singh 'Lalan', for alleged proximity towards ally Rashtriya Janaat Dal at the expense of loyalty to his own party.
'JD-U wants to emerge as the single largest party in Bihar after the next assembly polls by contesting more seats than the BJP.'
Sources within the INDIA bloc said appointing Nitish Kumar as convenor would lend credibility to the INDIA bloc's demand for conducting a nationwide caste census.
Is Nitish Kumar, seen here at an Iftar party in Patna on Friday, April 15, 2022, worried at the video making the rounds of social media of men wearing saffron scarves brandishing swords and shouting slogans outside a mosque in Chhapra, north Bihar?
A Division Bench headed by Chief Justice K Vinod Chandran passed the order on a bunch of petitions which had opposed the legislations brought by the Nitish Kumar government in November 2023.
"Best wishes to Nitish Kumar ji on being nominated as the chief minister. I hope he makes his priority positive issues such as aspirations of the people of Bihar, the NDA's promise of 19 lakh jobs-employment, education, health, livelihood, irrigation and justice rather than his ambition for the chair," Tejashwi wrote in a social media post.
Kumar had recently dumped the 'Mahagathbandhan', of which the Rashtriya Janata Dal was a key constituent, and returned to the NDA fold to form the government with support of the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Another instance of bridge collapse came to the fore in Bihar on Thursday, making it the 10th such incident to have been reported from the state in just over a fortnight, an official said.
Amid speculation over Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal-United's next move in the wake of vote counting trends, senior party leader K C Tyagi on Tuesday said they are in the National Democratic Alliance and 'we will be in the NDA'.
Jharkhand Mukti Morcha leader Hemant Soren on Sunday met Jharkhand Governor Santosh Kumar Gangwar and staked claim to form the government, soon after leaders of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) in the state unanimously elected him as the legislature party leader.
Saini's elevation as Haryana chief minister fits in with a pattern that has gathered pace in the BJP after the Congress and its allies like the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh and the Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar began making an aggressive bid to woo the largest group of communities and politically most significant, especially in Hindi-speaking states, by pushing for a caste census.
Lalu's son and heir apparent Tejashwi Yadav, however, sought to downplay the remarks made by his father, in an interview to a local news channel, claiming that the RJD supremo had merely tried to satisfy the curiosity of the prying media.
The Bihar CM may be in the Opposition but his endorsement of Ram Nath Kovind, the NDA's presidential candidate, is among the many recent decisions that puts him apart from the others.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies on Tuesday welcomed the Union Budget and said it focussed on youth, farmers, women, and has 'substantial allocations' for Maharashtra, but the opposition slammed the annual financial statement, claiming it neglected the western state and only seeks to please the saffron outfit's partners in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh.
Bihar assembly Speaker Awadh Bihari Chaudhary on Sunday called on Rashtriya Janata Dal president Lalu Prasad Yadav, at a time when the state was witnessing a big political churn.
Janata Dal-United president Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan on Saturday alleged that political strategist-turned-politician Prashant Kishor was 'working for' the Bharatiya Janata Party, as part of its 'conspiracies' to find a firm foothold in Bihar.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party falling short of a majority in the Lok Sabha and needing the National Democratic Alliance partners to form the government at the Centre, Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United head Nitish Kumar and Telugu Desam Party's N Chandrababu Naidu have emerged as potential kingmakers.
