IIn the run up to the lok Sabha polls, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday hit hard on the Congress for conspiring to deny special status to Bihar. While expressing surprise over media reports of Gujarat Government's BPl criteria of people earning below `10.80, Nitish Kumar also reiterated for strengthening secular forces through "possible unity" among the like-minded parties.
"The Congress conspired to deny the special status to Bihar which we've been demanding for a long time," charged Nitish.
Earlier on Sunday, while addressing Sankalp rally, Nitish had blamed the Congress and the UPA Government at the Centre for 'cheating' Bihar on its special status demand.
"We are cheated by the Congress as it put the process for granting special status to Bihar in the cold storage due to political reasons," he said at the rally.
He also explained that the UPA Government at the Centre deferred at the very last minute the meeting of a committee headed by the Union Finance Minister on November 26 when it was scheduled to take a decision for the special status grant or something equivalent to it on the basis of the Raghuram Rajan committee report.
While reacting over media reports on the Gujarat Government suggesting that it was using `10.80 a day as a limit to identify subsidy beneficiaries, the Bihar Chief Minister said that it was utter surprising for him and also "totally unacceptable".
"Whatever I read in the media, I can only say that it is most surprising and unacceptable…. it reflects that people do not have even basic understanding of what poverty means," he told mediapersons on the sidelines of his weekly janata durbar.
He further said that though he would not like to jump to any conclusion regarding such a report which has come in media but "it amazed a lot".
When asked about his effort for forging an alliance of 14 political parties, Nitish said that it's an effort to unite non-Congress and non-BJP platform. "It's a possible unity of Opposition parties and not a front," he added emphatically.
On the recent media reports and surveys projecting dismal performance of his party in the upcoming lok Sabha polls, Nitish said that "these surveys are nothing but a PR exercise but the people of the country are fully awake and aware".
"Sirf hawa banane se kamyabi nahi milegi…media report se bhram na pale neta… the reality is something else which we're seeing in our Sankalp rally," said the Chief Minister.
The people of the State and the country as well, he said, have been watching the good works done by the State Government and the failures of the Central Government. "They will consider everything in mind while exercising their franchise," he said.
"Every poll has its separate story…no will can say for sure what will happen but both the BJP and the Congress will not get success here in Bihar."