Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs and senior BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu on Sunday put up a forceful defence of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi both on party’s defeat in Delhi Assembly polls and in the Bihar imbroglio.
Addressing Press conference in Hyderabad on Sunday Naidu asserted that there is no decline in the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi due to the party’s loss in Delhi elections but admitted that it posed a challenge to the party.
“Our party will learn a lesson from this election and will gear up to face a united Opposition in the coming days,” he said. Naidu attributed AAP’s massive victory in Delhi to the fact that all the Opposition votes had consolidated in its favour. “But there was no fall in BJP’s vote percentage. Our strength has not weakened,” Naidu added.
Venakaiah Naidu said that Delhi polls had enhanced the possibility of all the Opposition parties getting united against the BJP. “Accordingly in the days to come we will accept the challenge of a direct face to face fight with the Opposition,” he said.
On the allegations of former Chief Minister of Bihar Nitish Kumar that Prime Minister Modi was scripting the crisis in his State, Naidu said that the situation was the result of drama that Nitish had played by installing a Dalit as the Chief Minister and now trying to remove him. “Modiji has no role in it. But Nitish is blaming Modi and Centre for his failures”.
Referring to Janata Dal (United), he said, “The name is ‘united’ but, as usual, they are divided. There is already a ‘war’ going on in Janata Parivar. They are divided and not united. The Centre has no role in that,” said Naidu.
“Who asked you to resign from the Chief Minister’s post and who asked you to make Jitan Ram Manjhi the Bihar Chief Minister, and why are you asking Manjhi to resign nowIJ” he asked Nitish Kumar. He said that due to the infighting in JD(U), attempts are being made to replace Manjhi and Modi has nothing to do with it.