'Both Pavan Varma and Prashant Kishor questioned the party president in a public forum.' 'That is why we had to show them the door.'
Prasanna D Zore/Rediff.com recaps emotions on a day that Bihar waited with bated breath.
Despite the show of unity, JD-U spokesmen Neeraj Kumar, however, said the coalition dharma is bigger than showing obstinacy.
It's official now. After a gap of 23 years, Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav and senior Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar will share dais and jointly address public meetings on Monday for by polls in Bihar's Hajipur and Mohiuddinnagar assembly constituencies.
The 94 constituencies which are going to poll on November 3 are in 17 districts: West Champaran, East Champaran, Sheohar, Sitamarhi, Madhubani, Darbhanga, Muzaffarpur, Gopalganj, Siwan, Saran, Vaishali, Samastipur, Begusarai, Khagaria, Bhagalpur, Nalanda and Patna.
The ruling BJP in UP, however, lost Khatauli to Samajwadi Party ally Rashtriya Lok Dal.
Sources said Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is 'satisfied' with the deputy CM's explanation.
The Congress will get three ministerial berths in the new Nitish Kumar government in Bihar, a senior party leader said.
'Voters from the forward castes voted for JD-U because they feared Laloo Yadav's return, but since that fear is no longer there they may not see the need to vote for Nitish Kumar anymore.'
'If the BJP continues with Nitish as CM, it will not consolidate its position further in future.'
Lalu Prasad and his Muslim-Yadav line has completely gone off track.
'The issue has been cleared by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief J P Nadda much before the elections'
Congress' poll strategist Prashant Kishor on Tuesday held a two-hour meeting with Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is trying to cobble together an alliance of like-minded parties ahead of Uttar Pradesh assembly polls due early next year.
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.
After days of tough posturing between leadership of the Janata Dal-United and the Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar on the issue of alliance for the assembly elections, action has now shifted to the national capital, where top leaders from both the parties will meet to thrash out the differences.
The alliance adopted a resolution to this effect and said its theme for the elections will be "Judega Bharat, Jeetega India, (India will unite, India will win)".
Launching a counteroffensive against the Bharatiya Janata Party for its 'return of jungle raj' remark, Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Tejaswi Yadav on Wednesday said if the killing of a youth in a road rage incident symbolised that, then even the national capital was no different.
If the Chirag Paswan-led LJP posts a good result, the young leader could become a formidable caste challenger in the years to come and a permanent fixture as a BJP ally, reports Aditi Phadnis.
Chaudhary sent his resignation immediately after assuming charge at 1 pm, informed sources said.
There are also over 10 million voters in the 18-29 age bracket. Winning them over could be Nitish Kumar's biggest challenge, reports Aditi Phadnis.
The meeting of opposition parties has been called by Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar to chalk out a joint strategy to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
A day after the by-election results in Bihar, though leaders of the Rahtriya Janata Dal and the Bharatiya Janata Party claimed victory after the RJD and BJP retained the Mokama and Gopalganj assembly seats respectively, the fact that both seats were won with a reduced margin indicates that there is nothing to celebrate for either party.
Paswan also said that BJP leaders were free to throw barbs at the LJP, as part of their "coalition dharma", but he would always hold Prime Minister Narendra Modi in high regard.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday met Rahul Gandhi at his residence in New Delhi as the talks on alliance to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party in Bihar polls gained momentum.
Ending days of speculation, senior Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar on Sunday said that Bihar's Jitan Ram Manjhi would continue as chief minister. "All speculations about Manjhi's removal were wrong," the former CM told the media soon after his return from New Delhi on Sunday.
JD-U sources conceded that the BJP's "Bihari martyrdom" line will give the coalition an edge or "at least help us combat anti-incumbency if the Opposition makes an issue of Nitish's governance".
'Bihar, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Bengal can be the game changers of 2024.'
'It is very unfortunate that the AAP seems to be looking at the issue through the prism of rivalry with Congress in Delhi and Punjab'
This is the fifth time that Nitish will be the chief minister of Bihar and this will be his third consecutive term.
Yadav, who is now leading his party as its chief ministerial candidate for the assembly polls due in a few months, made the charm offensive at a party function.
Bharatiya Janata Party Parliamentary Board Tuesday appointed former Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi as leader of the party in the legislative council and Nand Kishore Yadav as the head of the party in the state assembly.
Sources said the opposition parties would look to avoid the prickly leadership question as of now and emphasise on building a common ground.
Tejashwi, who has been chosen by the anti-National Democratic Alliance grouping as its chief ministerial candidate, is seeking re-election from Raghopur seat he won on his maiden outing in electoral politics in 2015.
Speculations are rife about a tie-up between the Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Janata Dal- United after Chief Minister Nitish Kumar resigned following the severe drubbing his party suffered at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Lok Sabha polls.
Paswan, who has chosen to plough a lonely furrow in the ongoing assembly elections, reiterated that the LJP was and will remain loyal towards the BJP, which was staring at the spectre of yet another "paltimaar" (volte face) by the JD-U president.
They had said they wanted to protest, while maintaining social distancing, against the attack on the family of a party supporter in which case a Janata Dal-United MLA has been named as an accused.
"I had sought an appointment with the PM to meet him along with an all-party delegation from Bihar, including RJD's Tejashwi Yadav, to discuss the issue of a caste-based census. I thank him for giving us time next Monday at 11 am," Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar told reporters in Patna.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday said he was neither a claimant for the prime minister's post nor desirous of it, his assertion coming amid speculation that his visit to the capital is to claim leadership of the opposition parties.
The grand alliance ministry, headed by Kumar, collapsed in July last year after the chief minister resigned over graft charge against his then deputy, Tejashwi Yadav.
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