There is no confusion or dispute in the 'Mahagathbandhan' over Tejashwi Yadav being the main face for the Bihar chief minister's post, Congress leader Kanhaiya Kumar said on Friday while asserting that the CM will be from the Rashtriya Janata Dal if the alliance gets a majority in the upcoming polls.
A total of 126 votes, including four of Congress and one of CPI, were cast in favour of the confidence motion while 24, including 22 of Lalu Prasad led RJD, voted against the motion as BJP members staged a walkout before the vote.
Bitter rivals in Bihar politics Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad will be neighbours now after the Janata Dal-United top leader abdicated power as chief minister in the face of severe drubbing in the recent Lok Sabha election.
Concealed beneath the feat, which testifies to his political acumen and survival instincts, is the fact that the 72-year-old leader could never remain at peace with his allies which also made him change partners frequently.
The Bihar CM will have make good on his poll promises of a clean administration, providing piped water, toilets, pucca roads and unemployment allowance
'The Congress has faded and fighting for survival.'
Ahead of the impending assembly polls, the rising crime graph and poor law and order situation have led to demands being revived to adopt UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's 'bulldozer' and police encounter policy in Bihar to deal with criminals.
The JD-U has insisted that Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is the leader of the alliance and it has been the "senior partner" in the state, indicating that it should get a major share.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United made public the names of candidates for all 101 seats it will be contesting in the assembly polls, with more than half of them from the backward and extremely backward classes.
Most JD-U ministers favour a return to the BJP-led NDA ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Dismissing charges of being an opportunist and of betraying the Bharatiya Janata Party, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Friday said that the Janata Dal-United quit the national Democratic Alliance as the saffron party did not keep its word about putting on hold contentious issues and not projecting leaders who cannot expand the coalition.
The opposition's presidential poll candidate Yashwant Sinha on Friday revealed that Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar refused to take his calls when he tried to seek the latter's support for his candidature.
"Public does not who 'Kharge Pharge' is. Even I don't know he was the president of Congress. Nobody knows him. Masses don't know him. The public knows Nitish Kumar. Nitish Kumar should become prime minister. He is popular all over India," Mandal said.
"People ask me why I am now criticising Nitish Kumar, having worked with him in the past. He was a different man back then. His conscience had not been put up for sale," said Kishor, who had managed the JD-U president's election campaign in 2015 and formally joined the party two years later.
Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi appears to be on the way out in the wake of his defiance as the Janata Dal-United is all set to replace him with his mentor Nitish Kumar at a meeting of the legislature party on Saturday.
Those who know the depths of the mindless lethargy that the Bihar bureaucracy had sunk into until two years ago, understand the importance of the unquantifiable but invaluable revival.
Police swung into action soon after learning about the posters put up at 'Chalukya Circle', just a stone's throw from the venue of the meeting which is being attended by Nitish Kumar.
Kumar's outburst came as opposition members stood in the well of the House, demanding that the state's amended reservation laws be incorporated in the 9th schedule of the Constitution to make it immune from legal scrutiny.
Around 275,000 migrant labourers and their family members have returned to the state. According to the state government, this number could exceed 1 million by the end of this month. As the NDA government in Bihar is scheduled to face polls at the end of this year, providing livelihoods to these people is on the top Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's agenda.
The Bihar CM further recounted the work done by his government to boost social welfare in the state and the efforts to strengthen the law and order in the state.
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.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar lost his temper in the state legislative council on Friday when an opposition RJD member flagged the issue of the "inadequate number" of girls' schools in her area. Kumar, who prides himself on having promoted women's empowerment, grew irritated and said, "Do you people even know what we have done for girls' education? Village girls hardly went to schools in Bihar until we came to power." He then launched a frontal attack on Rabri Devi, his predecessor, recalling the circumstances in which she had succeeded her husband Lalu Prasad, the RJD president, as the chief minister. The exchange of words led to chaos in the House before order was restored.
A BJP ally since the mid-90s, Kumar split with the party in 2014, only to realign three years later. In 2022, he again parted ways, vowing to dislodge the BJP from power at the Centre and bring together parties from across the country to form the INDIA bloc.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the Centre's decision to confer Bharat Ratna on his political mentor Karpoori Thakur.
Chirag Paswan has warned the BJP-led NDA that it will settle for nothing less than 40-plus seats in the 2025 Bihar polls, even threatening to contest all 243 constituencies independently if sidelined.
Bihar Congress chief Rajesh Ram raised doubts over the integrity of the counting process as Election Commission trends placed the NDA ahead. He alleged serious anomalies and accused the administration of attempting to steal votes, while other Congress leaders urged patience until final results.
The beneficiaries will get increased pensions of Rs 1,100 from July.
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.
Without naming Press Council of India Chairman Markandey Katju who had criticised Bihar Chief Minister on Friday, Nitish Kumar on Saturday said some people were moving in the state like the 'Ramayana's character 'Kalnemi' to turn a vibrant atmosphere of the state into gloom.
'The seats which we would be contesting have been identified. Respective candidates have also been finalised. Four non-performing sitting MLAs will be replaced with fresh faces.'
'Without our support Nitish Kumar wouldn't have become chief minister.' 'After the government was formed we became ministers, but our agenda remained the same: Amit Shah had promised reservation for Nishads.' 'He wouldn't listen, so we went to UP and contested 52 seats in the 2022 elections. He didn't like the idea of rebellion.' 'He saw that this man, coming from Bombay, is very sharp. He's made four MLAs now, tomorrow he'll make 40. A time will come when they will make it 125.' 'They bought our MLAs and ousted us from the government.'
The NDA in Bihar, led by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, strategically countered the Mahagathbandan's moves by implementing similar policies and announcements, effectively neutralising the MGB campaign promises and maintaining their political advantage.
Nitish Kumar has to eschew disastrous experiments with prohibition and reservations in the private sector. Unless he is dissuaded from pursuing these flawed measures, he will pave the way for Bihar to again become a part of the BIMARU group of sick states, says Amulya Ganguli.
The BJP and JDU leaders claimed that Prasad insulted women in the state with his comment.
Rajak said almost all ministers in the Bihar Cabinet are unhappy with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and things will become clear in the coming days.
The National Commission for Women (NCW) has demanded strong action from the Bihar assembly speaker against Chief Minister Nitish Kumar over his remarks in the assembly on the importance of women's education to control the population and demanded his apology.
Voters are weighing a stark trade-off -- between preserving a socially driven policy and reversing course to revive revenue, restore fiscal balance, and rein in the underground liquor economy.
All eyes are on the JD-U's national executive meeting on June 29 in New Delhi, where a decision in this regard may be taken.
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