As he snapped ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party, Bihar's caretaker chief minister Nitish Kumar has once again been pitched as a prime ministerial candidate for the 2024 elections by some, but a majority of the Opposition still view the Janata Dal-United leader with suspicion citing his numerous 'U-turns'.
"'So ja bete nahi to Gabbar Singh aa jayega'. Mothers, who have seen the jungle raj days in Bihar, please do tell your children, especially youth, on the polling day to cast their votes carefully, otherwise they (the RJD) may return to power... those who ran a regime of terror and fear," he told a press conference.
HAM's Bihar president Brishen Patel told reporters on Wednesday that his party can snap the alliance from the BJP after discussions on this matter.
"You can see all of us working together. There is no discontent. The problem is, today newspapers have more pages than before, news channels run 24X7 and then there is social media where anybody can say anything without worrying about backing a claim with facts," he said.
'There is no law and order in Bihar.' 'Criminals do as per their will.'
LJP sources said the BJP's defeat in the five state polls have ignited a rethink in the party over its ties with the saffron party.
National Democratic Alliance allies on Monday put up a united front amid vocal demands being made by some parties on their share of seats in Bihar polls but the crucial issue of seat-sharing was not discussed at their maiden joint meeting chaired by Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah.
Pointing out that the party had contested seven seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the state LJP chief said there was no reason why it would settle for less than that for the 2019 elections, or for six Lok Sabha seats and one in Rajya Sabha.
'I am in the NDA as of now,' Kushwaha said.
Hours before Union Home Minister Amit Shah's virtual rally in Bihar on Sunday, Rashtriya Janata Dal leaders and workers staged protests, beating utensils and blowing conch shells against what their leader Tejashwi Yadav dubbed as the ruling party's celebration of the devastation caused by COVID-19 and the lockdown.
Nitish Kumar, once seen as a potential rival to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, broke ranks with the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance coalition on Tuesday to stake claim as head of the rival 'Mahagathbandhan' (Grand Alliance) to be the chief minister of Bihar for the eighth time.
Nitish Kumar has to make an existential choice: Between governance and politics, argues Aditi Phadnis.
Other NDA allies, including the Lok Janshakti Party and the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party, will get due representation in the seat sharing formula, Shah said.
The series of meetings are being seen as an attempt by the Bharatiya Janata Party to reach out to allies who have either been criticising or expressing their dissent with the party and also to strengthen the National Democratic Alliance ahead of the Lok Sabha polls next year.
Narendra Modi is expected to have a 45-member council of ministers who will take oath along with him on Monday evening. The council of ministers is expected to have 23 Cabinet ministers, 10 ministers of state with independent charge and 11 ministers of state, according to sources.
When I first spoke about Nitish Kumar being PM material, many of you scoffed at me. Now you can see... it has happened often that I say something and it becomes a widespread sentiment later on," JD-U leader Upendra Kushwaha said.
RLSP leaders feel insulted after getting no response from the BJP on their demand for a 'respectful seat sharing formula' for the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
Uncertainty shadows the composition of the two main political alliances in Bihar with several parties still exploring their choices as the Election Commission on Friday announced the schedule for the assembly polls.
Addressing a press conference in Patna, All India Congress Committee general secretary Randeep Singh Surjewala said the party would like the Central Bureau of Investigation to complete its inquiry in three months and favoured setting up of a special court to facilitate expeditious trial.
Bihar being in the grip of a Dusshera festival mood, leaders of rival political groups including Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav on Tuesday used examples of slaying of Ravana to attack each other.
An electoral survey conducted by CNN IBN/IBN7-Axis in Bihar has given a clear edge to the Rashtriya Janata Dal-Janata Dal-United-led 'Mahagathbandhan', riding home the assembly elections with 137 seats (+/-8 seats) and a 46 per cent vote share.
Bihar assembly elections which are to be announced shortly are expected to be five-phased and around 50,000 paramilitary personnel will be deployed in each phase to ensure peaceful polling.
'By naming Tejashwi as the next CM candidate, he has put us in a dilemma.' 'Who will lead us in 2025?' 'What will happen to the party after 2025?'
'Shatrughan Sinha's name is in the Congress's probable candidates list.'
A day after Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi hinted at the next Bihar assembly polls being held in September-October, most of the political parties including ruling Janata Dal-United and Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party claimed they were fully ready for it.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's allies in Bihar Lok Janashakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party chief Upendra Kushwaha on Monday said that the Modi wave is sweeping the state and the ongoing Lok Sabha polls outcome will prove them right.
Reacting to allegations that his party was dividing anti-BJP votes, Owaisi said he was running a political party that has a right to contest on its own.
The final phase of polling on Saturday will cover 78 constituencies spread across 19 north Bihar districts.
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.
"We small parties, like the Apna Dal-S, want some respect to be shown to us. We, our leaders and workers feel hurt if due importance is not given to us," Ashish Patel told mediapersons
Responding to a query about corruption in the scheme's implementation, Minister of State for Rural Development Upendra Kushwaha said almost all members know about it and added that steps are being taken for improving the scheme.
School principal suspended, vice-principal and 14 other teachers transferred after a video emerged of a boy being thrashed by other schoolboys.
With a video of two sons of a murder accused mercilessly beating their Dalit classmatehere going viral on social media, the duo have been sent to a remand home.
BJP MP Subramanian Swamy also said he went to the Rajya Sabha daily and it was not his fault if the the House did not run.
The party, however, did not announce as whether it would merge with any other party or become part of some other alliance.
Kushwaha said Kumar remarks that the JD-U would not join the Modi cabinet reminded him of 'sour grapes'.
The incident comes against the backdrop of a raging debate on lack of scrutiny of the curriculum and content taught in schools.
A day after India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Cabinet of 45 ministers, the analysis has begun. Of the 44 ministers examined, a report by the Association for Democratic Reforms reveals that 13 of Modi's men have criminal charges registered against them.
He accused Modi of reducing the cabinet to a 'rubber stamp', 'betraying' backward classes and giving Bihar only 'jumlas'.
