Bihar’s Dy CM trashes reports of favours to kin in govt contracts

All allegations levelled against me are baseless. None of my family members are involved in the companies named as having been awarded tenders, deputy CM said.

Bihar’s deputy chief minister Tarkishore Prasad Thursday dismissed allegations that his kin were favoured in the award of contracts for the Nitish Kumar government’s showpiece scheme to provide tap water to every village household.

Bihar deputy chief minister Tarkishore Prasad (HT File)

“All allegations levelled against me are baseless. None of my family members are involved in the companies named as having been awarded tenders. Only four contracts out of the total 2,800 was awarded to my family member Puja Kumari as per rules in 2019 and the water is being supplied in that area. All the work was completed before I became the deputy CM. So, the allegations that I influenced the award of contract are wrong,” a press release issued by Prasad said.

Ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) leaders also came out in defence of Prasad, who has been in the line of Opposition’s fire for the past few days following a media report that said his kin had got high-value government contracts in violation of rules.

The tender for the said work was floated in December 2019 when he (Prasad) was Katihar MLA. His son was one of the bidders and was awarded the contract through due process. The said work was completed on September 2020, before he became the deputy CM. At no point did Prasad influence the process,” said Dr Sanjay Jaiswal, president of the state unit of Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), the biggest constituent of the NDA.

“It was a routine meeting to discuss party affairs,” Jaiswal said when asked about a meeting of BJP ministers on Wednesday evening at the residence of deputy CM Renu Devi, also from the same party.

BJP state vice-president Rajiv Ranjan said nobody could cast aspersions on Prasad’s character. “He is one of the finest leaders who is thoroughly dedicated for the state’s development,” said Ranjan.

Former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustani Awami Morcha (Secular), also an NDA constituent, ruled out Tarkishore Prasad’s involvement in the tender process. Its spokesperson Danish Rizwan said, “Unlike the Lalu-Rabr era when tenders were awarded to their acquaintances, the tender process under the NDA government is as clear as water.”

After the media report that claimed that the deputy CM’s kin had got contracts worth ₹53 crore in the state government’s Har Ghar Jal scheme to provide tap water to every village household, the Opposition parties have sought to corner the Nitish Kumar government on the corruption issue.

Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), has accused the state government of looting the treasuries.

On Thursday, Yadav dragged the name of former deputy CM and Rajya Sabha member Sushil Kumar Modi, alleging that the tender of the said project was awarded to Prasad’s kin during his tenure. “Tarkishore Prasad was the MLA of Katihar and it was on Modi’s recommendation that he became the deputy CM,” he said and alleged that tender was given to Prasad’s family for generating money for the 2020 assembly elections.

Dubbing the water supply scheme as “Nal Dhan Yojana (scheme to siphon money)”, he asked the CM to name 50 panchayats where the scheme is running efficiently.

After RJD and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) formed an alliance and won the 2015 assembly elections, Modi had levelled serious allegations of corruption against Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, the then deputy CM, through a series of media briefings and posts on social media, which eventually led to a break in the RJD-JD(U) alliance and Yadav’s ouster from the government.