Rashtriya Janata Dal leader and Leader of the Opposition in Bihar Assembly Tejashwi Yadav on Monday took a swipe at Nitish Kumar over the Chief Minister hitting the Assembly election campaign trail in Delhi alongside BJP leader and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. Mr. Yadav alleged that Mr. Kumar is “defending the indefensible” in his speeches while sharing the stage with Mr. Shah, whom he called the CM’s “mahboob”.
“You can’t give an account of your 15-year rule [in Bihar] but you went to Delhi to seek an account of the opposition’s government… this is absolutely defending the indefensible,” said the RJD leader, who is also campaigning for his party candidates in some constituencies of Delhi. The RJD, which is in an alliance with the Congress, is contesting four seats in Delhi.
Mr. Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) is in the fray in two Assembly seats — Burari and Sangam Vihar — as part of the BJP-led NDA alliance, and on Sunday he addressed public meetings in both of them while sharing the dais with Mr. Shah and BJP president J.P. Nadda.
‘Uttering lies’
“Nitish Kumar shared the stage yesterday with his mahboob Amit Shah in Delhi for the Assembly elections and showed his political compulsions, shrewdness and plight despite his best efforts to hide them. He broke all his past records of uttering lies in calling national capital Delhi as a city worse than Bihar,” said Mr. Yadav, reminding the Bihar CM that “crores of Biharis have been migrating to Delhi”.
While claiming that the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government has failed to perform on all fronts, Mr. Kumar, while making an oblique reference to his Delhi counterpart, said during his speeches on Sunday that “some people have the habit of praising oneself… the government which got the mandate to govern Delhi did nothing on any front in the last five years”.
“If you think infrastructure, healthcare system and education of Delhi are worse than Bihar, then only God can fathom your mental state. You should say in Delhi [rallies] how many factories and companies were set up in Bihar and how many youth got employment there,” said the RJD leader, attacking the Bihar government over its alleged failure on several fronts such as the death of hundreds of children due to AES in Muzaffarpur, sexual abuse of 34 girls at a shelter home in the same city and unprecedented waterlogging in Patna and deaths of several people due to flood and heat strokes.
“Instead of demanding special category status and a special package for Bihar, assistance for flood victims or demanding Bihar’s right in the Central pool [of taxes] from the government, you termed those who are trying to snatch citizenship and change the Constitution as popular and great leaders,” he said.
JD(U) leaders hit back
JD(U) leaders in Bihar wasted no time in hitting back at Mr. Yadav.
“Tejashwi Yadav does not possess any moral right to comment on what our leader Nitish Kumar says. Everyone knows what his parents’ regime of 15 years did for the State and what the Nitish government has done,” a senior JD(U) leader reacted.
