Nitish Kumar was a part of the NDA cabinet where Advani held the home portfolio.
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According to JD-U leaders, Nitish Kumar will take oath as chief minister along with a 36-member council of ministers on November 20.
Sure enough, the charges made by Advani, Murali Manohar Joshi, Shanta Kumar and Yashwant Sinha, were rebuffed by three former party presidents, Rajnath Singh, Venkaiah Naidu and Nitin Gadkari, all union ministers. He comes from the Yadav community (i.e. OBC) and has a strong Muslim-Yadav vote bank in Bihar. He has wished Nitish good luck, while expressing his inability to come. Nitish, portrayed as a “Vikas Purush”, has persistently pushed for “development” of the state. A growth that was largely attributed to improved law and order situation.
“Now my armoury has sufficient arms and ammunitions to ensure defeat to enemy number one – the BJP”, said Nitish at the time.
“Then I sought an end to “Bihari Vs Bahari” debate that raged during recent Bihar campaign since I believed that no countryman could be termed as outsider in that state”, Sinha said.
Now, the biggest challenge for the Nitish Kumar will be to provide clean and efficient government.
JD(U) won 71 seats out of a total of 101 it had contested. The “secular” Mahagatbandhan was thus a formidable alliance that had thwarted BJP’s Hindutva ideology.
When the parliamentary board of the BJP met to announce that “nobody” in particular could be blamed for the Bihar debacle, the BJP had behaved exactly like other parties where criticism of the top leaders is neither encouraged nor tolerated.
Singh accused Modi of having compromised the dignity of the Prime Minister’s Office by leading an “enemy-like” campaign in the polls and using unparliamentary language.
BJP’s communal hatred and intolerance has already produced backlash. Booker prize victor and activist Arundhati Roy also returned her National Award because she was “shocked” at the “growing intolerance” fostered by the present government.
The so called “backward classes” have acquired a distinct national identity and have actively democratised and shaped Indian politics in the period after the 1990 Mandal Commission Report, which identified and legitimised them.
“Probably, Mr. Modi was kept in dark about ground realities in Bihar by the party leadership”.
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Prashant Kishore with a team of youths trained in management and IT skills contributed immensely towards creating “Brand Modi” in the last Lok Sabha elections.
