Union Minister of State for Human Resource Department and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) chief Upendra Kushwaha has, of late, been making headlines with his flip-flop on political statements, fuelling speculation on electoral alliances.
Mr. Kushwaha’s gameplan, many believe, is to bargain for more seats ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. On Friday, while addressing journalists in Patna, he stirred further speculation, asserting, “There are some people within the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) who do not want to see Narendra Modi as Prime Minister. They create confusion over the declaration on seat sharing; no seat sharing discussion has been carried out yet within the NDA and I am very much in the NDA.”
Informed sources told The Hindu that the statement was directed towards his political bête noire Janata Dal-United (JD-U) president Nitish Kumar, with whom he parted ways in 2013 to float the RLSP, which contested the 2014 Lok Sabha elections as an NDA constituent, winning three seats.
Contradictions
Later, although Mr. Kumar snapped ties with the Rashtriya Janata Dal-led (RJD) ‘Grand Alliance’ in July 2017 and returned to the NDA, the political animosity between Mr. Kushwaha and him remained.
However, Mr. Kushwaha said, “With Nitish Kumar, the NDA has been strengthened.” He also refrained from making any attack on RJD chief Lalu Prasad or his family members. “They [the cases] are all legal issues and not political,” he said.
Recently, while addressing a function in Patna on the birth centenary of veteran socialist leader B. P. Mandal, architect of the Mandal Commission, Mr. Kushwaha generated considerable political heat with his kheer analogy.
“If milk and rice are mixed, a tasty and healthy kheer will be made,” he said in an apparent reference to the politically powerful cattle-rearing Yadavs, hinting at a possible political tie-up with the RJD.
