Former Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who has been elected leader of the JD(U) legislature Party, apprehended that the BJP might create disturbance and even violence in the Assembly to precipitate the promulgation of President’s Rule in Bihar. Once they succeed in their game plan, it will provide an opportunity to the Governor to recommend Central rule, he said while talking to media on Sunday.
“They want to implicate Assembly Speaker Udai Narain Chaudhary and to restrain him from presiding over the House. The BJP and Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi are unanimous to remove the Speaker and a petition has also been filed in the Patna High Court against him,” said Nitish.
“The BJP is scared of me and for that the party scripted the plan to give extended time to Manjhi to prove his majority. This move has opened the doors for horse-trading,” he said and added if he is being accused by the BJP of horse-trading, the BJP is itself responsible for this. Had the Governor asked Manjhi to go for floor test without delay, this situation would not have arisen, he said.
Hitting at BJP and Manjhi, the JD(U) stalwart said the characters because of whom lalu Prasad faced criticism and charges of Jungle Raj are now standing left and right of Manjhi. He was referring to two highly controversial former lieutenants of RJD supremo: Anirudha Prasad alias Sadhu Yadav and Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav. Both of them have publicly supported Manjhi. While Sadhu had left RJD sometimes back, Pappu is RJD MP from Madhepura and going against party line on support to Nitish.
On the demand of secret voting on the confidence vote, Nitish said there was no scope of secret ballot under the Xth Schedule of the Constitution and a Government cannot run on secret support.
The JD(U), RJD and Bihar Congress leaders launched attack on Governor Keshri Nath Tripathi and said he was speaking like a politician and acting like the activist of BJP. They alleged that following unabated announcements and Cabinet decisions by a minority Government headed by a person who has been expelled by his party, the State has been thrown in a chaotic situation and accused BJP of this 'anarchy'.
The State presidents of three parties at a joint Press conference here on Sunday demanded that the Governor should restrain Manjhi from approving controversial decisions from the Cabinet to meet his political ends and to please different sections of the society. Nitish said there is no meaning of such decisions because they are not backed by the budgetary allocation.
Squarely blaming BJP for the political upheaval in Bihar, State JD(U) president Bashistha Narain Singh, State RJD presidnet Ram Chandra Purbe and Bihar Congress chief Ashok Chaudhary urged the Governor to restrain Manjhi from making unabated decision almost every day. “If he has given him time till February 20 to prove his majority, he should also ask him to stop holding Cabinet meetings and making decisions,” said Singh and alleged that whatever is happening in Bihar has been scripted in Delhi and Bihar BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi is acting at the behest of Prime Minister Narendra Modi behind the curtain.
Purbe said Manjhi should have resigned after being expelled from the party. “He is now unattached from JD(U) but has attached himself with BJP,” he said and added that there are plenty of instances of transfer of power from one party to another and from one individual to another person because the change of leadership is the prerogative of the party. Chaudhary said Manjhi was emotionally blackmailing in the name of Mahadalit.