'The BJP should be really wary of Nitish Kumar, or he will also take the BJP down with him.'
The Union home minister recalled that the BJP had won far greater number of seats in the last assembly polls than the JD(U) but Prime Minister Narendra Modi kept up his promise to back Kumar for another term in office.
He reaffirmed that parties opposed to the BJP can win with a "huge majority" in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls if they agree to join hands.
Janata Dal-United parliamentary board chief Upendra Kushwaha said that violence was 'deplorable' but hastened to add 'Besides making an appeal for peace, we can do little'.
History, incidentally, has often been the stick that the BJP and the JD-U have used to beat each other with.
The condition of Kushwaha, the former Union Minister, is all right, although he has been advised rest, hospital sources said.
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.
BJP candidate Kedar Prasad Gupta defeated Manoj Singh Kushwaha of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United by 3,645 votes in Kurhani.
Former Union minister RCP Singh on Thursday rued the "witch hunt" in the Janata Dal-United which he felt had resulted in many of his loyalists being sacked after the impression grew that he has ceased to be in the good books of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
Soren spent more than an hour with Prasad at RIMS Director's bungalow, where the RJD leader is staying. Coming out of the RIMS, Soren told reporters, 'we will fight Bihar elections together'.
The RJD is yet to complete its seat-sharing talks with smaller allies and the Left parties.
Union minister RCP Singh, who was recently denied another term in the Rajya Sabha by the Janata Dal-United he formerly headed, should "heed the message" and resign from the cabinet, a key political aide of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has said.
K C Tyagi, senior Janata Dal-United leader and close confidante of party president Sharad Yadav, on Saturday filed nomination for the lone Rajya Sabha seat vacant from Bihar following resignation of rebel leader Upendra Kushwaha.
Suspended Janata Dal-United MP Upendra Kushwaha on Friday resigned from the party, slamming Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's alleged "autocratic" functioning in Bihar.
The minister was on his way to Motihari to attend PM Modi's rally. He never made it.
The order that was passed less than a week ahead of the first phase of polls scheduled on October 10 throws a spanner in the election process.
His resignation came hours after reports surfaced that the party has sought an explanation from him over allegations of corruption levelled by some unidentified workers.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday favoured a thorough inquiry into allegations of phone tapping with the help of Pegasus spyware which has led to a logjam in Parliament.
The speculations were triggered by Kumar's reference to the Rajya Sabha being "the only House" he has not been a member of.
The Aam Aadmi Party on Tuesday alleged that the Indian Army was using caste as a factor for recruitment under the Agnipath scheme, drawing a swift rebuttal from Defence Minister Rajnath Singh who rejected the charge as a "rumour".
Modi did not have the guts to face the students of the country and so he crushed them using the police, he alleged. "I challenge the prime minister to go to any of the universities, stand over there without his police, without his infrastructure and tell the people what is he going to do with this country," the Congress leader said.
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'.
While the assembly elections are being seen as largely a contest between the NDA and the Grand Alliance, the state has been witness to mushrooming of "morchas" (fronts) which may queer the pitch for the lead players in a tight contest.
With the election results on a knife's edge earlier in the day, many thought AIMIM could play a key role in the formation of the next government in case there was a hung assembly, having captured a sizeable number of seats in the state's Seemanchal region, which was being seen as a stronghold of the grand opposition alliance.
'The JD-U and RLSP will have to listen to whatever Amit Shah says.' 'The BJP has so much power that he will snub either of the two parties.'
Kushwaha said a delicious "kheer" can be prepared with milk from the Yadavs and rice from the Kushwahas.
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.
"'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.
'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?'
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.
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.
'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.
"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.
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.
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.
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.
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