Patna: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is expected to give his resignation on Saturday afternoon and sources say he might take oath for the eight time as the Chief Minister of Bihar on Sunday.
The biggest question that is being asked is what prompted Nitish Kumar to switch from the INDIA bloc to NDA and the simple answer is the Ram temple’s consecration in Ayodhya and the way it has created a wave in favour of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the country.
Sources said that Nitish Kumar was feeling insecure in the INDIA bloc as several political experts, including Prashant Kishor had said that if the JD-U stayed in the Opposition alliance it would not get even five seats in Bihar.
In fact Prashant Kishor claimed that if the JD-U won more than five seats, he would apologize before the country.
Also, Nitish Kumar feels that his future does not look bright in the INDIA bloc. He spearheaded the formation of the INDIA bloc but failed to be the prime ministerial candidate of the alliance.
As several leaders of the INDIA bloc were not in favour of Nitish Kumar, they ignored him.
This was apparent in the second meeting in Bengaluru when Nitish Kumar returned to Patna without participating in the press briefing. He was ignored in the third meeting in Mumbai as well.
Soon after that Nitish Kumar showed his anger in a CPI rally in the first week of October by publicly blaming the Congress party for delaying the seat sharing and not looking at the working of the INDIA bloc.
At that time, the Congress party was busy with the elections of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Telangana. And after it lost the three states, Nitish Kumar was relentless in his attacks on the grand old party on the subject of seat sharing.
Plus, Nitish Kumar was not comfortable with the RJD and the Congress party in Bihar. He always thinks that the future of his party is brighter within the NDA rather than with the Mahagathbandhan.
He was the Chief Minister of Bihar for a long time with the help of the BJP. He was also the Union Minister during the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Government.
Plus, there is a buzz in Bihar’s political circles about issues like Tejashwi Yadav going to Tirupati Balaji with the family in a chartered plane, Cabinet Ministers under the RJD quota not taking decisions without consulting him and Tejashwi Yadav ignoring the public meetings of Nitish Kumar.
Also, there were rumours that Tejashwi Yadav might break the JD-U to form the government in Bihar. This could be the reason why Nitish Kumar took control of the party and became the National President of the JD-U by replacing Lalan Singh.
All these issues combined with the wave of support for the BJP after the Ram Temple consecration could have triggered Nitish Kumar’s desire to exit from the Mahagathbandhan.
That he was turning against his alliance partners became evident when on the day of Karpoori Thakur’s 100 birth anniversary, Nitish Kumar while addressing a gathering targeted dynastic politics.
Though he did not take the name of any leader but it was clear that he was targeting Lalu Prasad Yadav and Rahul Gandhi. He also talked about Jungle Raj during the Lalu-Rabri Government before 2005.
Nitish Kumar also claimed that he was walking on the path of Karpoori Thakur and not promoting any of his family members just like Karpoori Thakur did in his life.
After Nitish Kumar, referred to dynastic politics Rohini Acharya, the second daughter of Lalu Prasad Yadav put up three posts targeting the Bihar Chief Minister on X.
Though Rohini Acharya deleted the posts after a couple of hours but it was good enough to show the point of view of the Lalu family on the ongoing tussle between them and Nitish Kumar.
She said in the first post: “Some people declare themselves as socialist stalwarts but their ideology changes like the wind.”
Though Rohini Acharya did not name anyone but it was clear who she was targeting.
In the second post Rohini Acharya said, “Showing anger won’t help as none of their own were qualified enough to carry forward their legacy. Their intentions are not right.”
In the third post she said that “some people do not do any introspection on their shortcomings, and fling mud on others.”
Following these posts, an angry-looking Nitish Kumar presided over the Cabinet meeting on Thursday.
Rohini Acharya stayed in the Cabinet meeting for 15 minutes and did not interact with any leaders of the RJD, including her brother Tejashwi Yadav. Later in the day she deleted the posts.
So, clearly all was not right in the Mahagathbandhan and the wave of support across the country for the BJP after the consecration of the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya seemed to have pushed an unhappy Nitish Kumar right into the saffron camp.
(IANS)
