In a strong reminder to the BJP over the projection of Prime Ministerial candidate for the 2014 lok Sabha elections, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar reaffirmed that the JD(U), which has given the BJP time till December to declare a Prime Ministerial candidate, will not keep reiterating its stand every now and then as it is a political party and not the publisher of a daily news bulletin.
Inducting senior lJP leader Shailendra Pratap Singh into the JD(U) at the State party office on Friday, Kumar told newspersons that the JD(U) has already made its position on the issue of Prime Ministerial candidate very clear before the largest ally of the NDA (BJP) and hence does not see any reason to make further observation on the matter.
In reply to a query on senior BJP leader Sushma Swaraj’s statements on Prime Ministerial nominee in New Delhi recently, Kumar said that one does not need to make one’s point time and again as it serves no purpose.
She was quoted as saying that the BJP will first decide whether the party will have a face of PM candidate and if the party decides to have it, who this will be depends on decisions to be made at the party Parliamentary Board meeting at an appropriate time.
Evading a reply to Sushma Swaraj not ruling out projection of BJP patriarch lK Advani as the PM nominee, the Chief Minister said that the party has already elucidated its stand in the political resolution of the JD(U), which was adopted at the party’s national council meeting in New Delhi recently.
In the political resolution, the JD(U) has made it clear that the image of the PM nominee should be such that his secular credibility in a multi-lingual country like India should be beyond doubt. The candidate should be in favour of inclusive politics and committed and sensitive towards the development of backward States and regions.
Adopting a highly critical approach towards IPl, Nitish Kumar said that the IPl has become very commercialised and “so many games are being played in the IPl game”.
Though not giving any direct reply if the IPl should be banned, Bihar Chief Minister said, “IPl ek tarah ki vikriti hai” (IPl is just like the perversion of the game), adding that the job of managing any game should be left to players only.
He said that socialist leader Ram Manohar lohia always used to prefer hockey or footfall to five-day test cricket but the cricket game itself kept changing its format, first introducing 50-over game and subsequently truncating the game to 20 over each.
The profit motives and media hype are also playing their respective roles in the IPl game, he added.