Bihar’s chief minister Nitish Kumar submitted his resignation to Governor Phagu Chauhan on Tuesday afternoon and by evening, returned to stake claim having ditched the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance for a second time to realign with friend-turned-foe-turned-friend Rashtriya Janata Dal.
The developments came after months of subtle shifts in Kumar’s Janata Dal (United), or JD(U), in its rhetoric towards the RJD-led opposition amid signs of rifts within the NDA.
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“Today at the meeting of all legislators and MPs, it was decided that we should leave National Democratic Alliance (NDA). I accepted their decision and tendered my resignation as CM of NDA to Governor,” Kumar said in a brief interaction with media persons after his first meeting with the governor at 4pm.
Less than an hour later, along with RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav and Congress’s Bihar in-charge Bhakt Charan Das, Kumar returned to Raj Bhawan, this time as part of the Mahagathbandhan, to stake claim to the government citing the support of 164 MLAs.
This is the second time the JD(U) has broken its alliance with the BJP and joined hands with the RJD-led opposition — the first was in 2013 when the party exited after 17 years in the NDA. But in 2017, in a sequence of events nearly as dramatic as Tuesday’s, Kumar ditched the so-called Grand Alliance and returned to the NDA. In the 2020 Assembly elections, the party was for the first time reduced to third position in the state, with the RJD becoming the largest and the BJP the second largest party.
{{/usCountry}}This is the second time the JD(U) has broken its alliance with the BJP and joined hands with the RJD-led opposition — the first was in 2013 when the party exited after 17 years in the NDA. But in 2017, in a sequence of events nearly as dramatic as Tuesday’s, Kumar ditched the so-called Grand Alliance and returned to the NDA. In the 2020 Assembly elections, the party was for the first time reduced to third position in the state, with the RJD becoming the largest and the BJP the second largest party.
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Addressing media persons briefly after Kumar’s resignation, BJP state president Sanjay Jaiswal called it a “deceit with the people of the state” who had given NDA the mandate in 2020 Assembly elections. “It is for Nitish Kumar to answer how and why he did it,” he added.
BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad, too, said it was an insult to the mandate of the people. “If Nitish Kumar had problems with the BJP, he would have never become the CM,” he added.
Kumar, for his part, said he was never ready to accept the CM’s post after the 2020 election results, but was asked to continue. “But the way things unfolded, every one of us wanted to get out of the NDA. We have zero tolerance to corruption. We want communal amity, but the way unnecessary controversies were being created, it was found difficult to continue. We will continue to move on our path together,” he said.
Following the second meeting, the new alliance partners addressed reporters afresh, when RJD’s Yadav said: “I had told him (Kumar) to resign and we will then decide the future course of action. He resigned and we are now doing what is required. Nitishji is the most experienced leader. In the entire Hindi belt, BJP has no ally anymore, as it has gobbled up all its allies.”
“What was happening in Bihar is not hidden from anyone. The country is grappling with price rise, communal tension and security issues, but the BJP is busy playing its own game,” he added.
After accepting the resignation, the Governor said he will look possible options, but with the kind of numbers the new alliance has, it is a straightforward case. The majority mark is 122, and the strength of 164 puts the alliance beyond it.
A tweet from RJD’s official Twitter handle in the evening said the chief minister and his deputy will take oath of office at 2pm on Wednesday and that Kumar’s resignation has been accepted by the Governor.
The political action began at 10, Circular road residence in the morning where Grand Alliance legislators, including those of the Congress, attended a meeting. This was followed by a meeting of RJD legislators. The Congress and Left party legislators handed over a letter of support to Yadav.
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The JD(U) met at 11 am and in three hours’ time, it was decided to sever ties with the BJP.
A stone’s throw from the CM’s residence, the BJP held its own parallel meeting at deputy CM Tar Kishore Prasad’s home, where the party decided none of its ministers would resign and they would instead wait for JD(U)’s move, people aware of the matter said.
At the meeting, the CM is understood to have told party legislators and MPs that he had been driven to the wall by the BJP which tried to weaken the JD(U) first by propping up Chirag Paswan’s rebellion and later through his own party’s former national president RCP Singh.
Relations between the BJP and the JD(U) have been worsening for quite some time in the wake of disagreements over a host of issues including caste census, population control and the ‘Agnipath’ defence recruitment scheme.