The Centre on Friday targeted Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar with his intention to restore Urdu in schools, in a counter-attack over his allegation about the lack of work being done in poor states. The state unit of the BJP in Bihar, which has been sore since Kumar snapped ties with it, accused the CM of ‘creating Pakistan in Bihar’.
“CM Nitish Kumar’s intention is to restore Urdu teachers in every school. Why is there a need to employ Urdu-knowing people in the Bihar assembly? Now Urdu translators will be appointed in every police station,” state BJP spokesman Nikhil Anand said.
“In the Muslim-dominated districts of Bihar, lives of Dalits, OBCs and EBCs get ruined…Brother, don’t create a Pakistan in Bihar, go to Pakistan yourself,” he alleged.
Targeting the Centre in a veiled attack, Nitish Kumar claimed that they were doing little work for poorer states apart from “prachar prasar (propaganda)”. Kumar lamented that had their demands been accepted, the state would have developed by leaps and bounds. He claimed that even the long-standing demand for special status to Bihar, which “all poor states should get”, was not accepted.
“Gareeb gurba rajyon mein kuchh ho raha hai? Jhuthe prachar prasar mein laga rahta hai (Is anything worthwhile happening in poor states? Only propaganda is underway),” Kumar said yesterday without taking any names.
This is not the first time the longest-serving chief minister of Bihar had raised the demand after coming out of the NDA alliance in August this year. In September, his party had renewed their attack on the BJP at Centre for not giving special status to Bihar.
“We remained hamstrung as our demand for special status, which should be granted to all states, was not met,” the JD(U) leader remarked.
Kumar has also been pitching for a united Opposition to take on the saffron party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. He has also declared that all backward states, including Bihar, will get special status if Opposition parties succeed in forming the next government at the Centre.
