Patna: Amid the prevailing rift in Bihar’s ruling alliance, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad on Wednesday said Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was free to chart his own course and made it clear his son, deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, would not resign.
The two leaders have been at loggerheads for the past 20 days since the CBI registered a case of corruption against Yadav.
The Janata Dal United (JD-U), headed by Kumar, wants Yadav to resign while the RJD has made is clear its ally’s demand will not be fulfilled.
“There is no dispute from my side. I have made Nitish Kumar the chief minister and I am not going to break the alliance although I don’t know what step the chief minister initiates,” RJD chief Prasad told the media on Wednesday at the end of RJD legislature party meeting.
According to him, the BJP was desperate to ally with the JD-U.
The RJD chief said the people had given a mandate to the Grand Alliance for five years, and there was no threat to the alliance from his side.
“We have built the alliance with great difficulty and there is no threat from this side. However, Nitish Kumar is free to pull out of the alliance if he wants to,” he said.
Prasad further asserted his deputy chief minister son would not resign nor would they give the JD-U clarifications about their alleged involvement in the corruption case.
“We will present our sides to the agencies concerned. But why should we clarify to the JD-U? Is it the police?” asked Prasad and also claimed the JD-U never sought for resignation of his son.
Prasad’s deputy chief minister son, on the other hand, launched a blistering attack on the BJP for trying to cause a split in the ruling alliance and alleged a senior BJP leader had been constantly working against the interest of the people of Bihar.
“The grand alliance was given the mandate for five years but the Sushil Kumar Modi had been constantly working against the interests of Bihar,” alleged Tejashwi, describing Modi as an “outsider”.
“A rank outsider Modi had been defaming the people of Bihar by staying put in Bihar although the people of the state gave him enough respect and made the deputy chief minister,” he alleged.
He alleged the BJP and its ideological fountainhead RSS were busy trying to dislodge the anti-BJP governments in every states. “The people of Bihar gave the mandate to the Grand Alliance for five years but the BJP wants to unsettle it,” Tejashwi said. “This is negative politics of the BJP”, he said.
He clarified the RJD allowed Nitish Kumar to become the chief minister despite winning less number of seats in the election and never interfered in the functioning of the government.
