JD (U) national president and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is in IT city Bengaluru on Wednesday and joined the Karnataka poll kurukshetra to stake claim for a pie. Nitish who arrived in the afternoon addressed JD(U) workers convention and expressed fear over prevailing tension in the country. He said the need of the hour is peace and harmony. Nitish is trying to expand JD(U) in Karnataka. However he refused to speak about the political situation in the State.
He said “There is an atmosphere of tension; everybody is attacking each other nobody looks at the work done. I feel country can develop only when there is peace and harmony. In the end the victory will be of those who fight for the people”.
“I do not want to comment on the political situation in the State today but I will speak about what we can do for Karnataka. What is being done in Bihar, if it is replicated in Karnataka, which is already a developed State, it will take the State to new heights”, he added.
“In Bihar, 12.5% children were uneducated so I took it up as a challenge and decided to make it our goal that all children should go to school. There were very few girls going to the upper primary school because she wasn't comfortable in the clothes. We started giving them two uniforms, a pair of shoes and a bag and soon the number of girls students went up considerably,” he said talking about Bihar model of development.
Nitish recollected how JD(U) was born in Karnataka with the visionaries like JH Patel, Ramkrishna Hegde and Geroge Fernandes and their contributions to the development of the country. He said “JD(U) was born in Karnataka. This state has a long history of socialist movements. JH Patel was the first person to speak in Kannada in Parliament when he was elected in 1967. There have been such rich movements here like land reforms, Kagodu agitation, anti English agitation etc, which inspired us when we were young. Hegde strengthened panchayati Raj and brought in 33% reservation for women”. Bihar Chief Minister said his party and government will not compromise on communal riots and corruption. Nitish defended the prohibition in Bihar and said it has helped in flow of tourist into Bihar.
“After prohibition people said tourists will decrease but the opposite has happened. I said tourists don't come here to drink and tourists doubled. Nobody else had the will to do this. In the evenings earlier their used to be problems but now there is peace. This does not happen by just bringing in legislation. You have to have a continuous campaign”, he added.
According to sources in the JD(U) they are expected to contest 25 to 30 seats in Karnataka May 12 assembly polls. It is quite interesting that Nitish led JD(U) is going on its own in the Karnataka poll not supporting the BJP.
Sharad Yadav was in Bengaluru recently and had a meeting with his faction to contest in the polls. However Nitish Kumar’s visit signifies his decision to revive JD(U) in other states ahead of general election in 2019 is significant in changing political scenario. JD(U) national general secretary and Karnataka in-charge Sanjay Jha said that Nitish wants to look beyond Bihar.