Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday made it clear he was looking forward to passing on the mantle to his young deputy Tejashwi Yadav, leaders emerging from a meeting of legislators of the ruling “mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance)” said.
Deputy CM Yadav, 33, is the younger son of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad, who is currently recuperating at a hospital in Singapore after undergoing kidney transplant.
Kumar was speaking at the meeting of the Grand Alliance legislators at the central hall of state legislative building on Tuesday, after the first day of winter session was adjourned following obituary references.
This is the first time Kumar has projected Yadav as CM candidate.
“The chief minister pointed towards Tejashwi ji and said he is the leader of the future, under whose leadership the 2025 assembly polls in the state would be fought. He set two targets — one, a united opposition could defeat the Narendra Modi-led BJP in 2024 and the second, bring back GA to power in Bihar 2025 under Tejashwi Yadav,” said Congress MLA Ajeet Sharma.
Former state Congress chief Madan Mohan Jha, who also attended the meeting, confirmed the development.
“There is nothing unusual in it. He (Kumar) has said several times that he (Tejashwi) is the future leader. There is no confusion in that,” said minister Vijay Kumar Chowdhary, who is from Kumar’s party JD-U.
“Nitish Kumar also made it clear again that he was not in the race for prime ministership. But he still feels BJP can be defeated in 2024 if the opposition stands united. And he will continue to work in that direction,” Chowdhary said.
On Monday, while addressing a function after inaugurating a dental college at Nalanda, Kumar had said, “I have been doing the work in all sectors… whatever is left now, Tejashwi ji will get it done and will continue to do so. There will be no problem in that.”
Tejashwi Yadav, who led his party RJD into the 2020 assembly polls, was cautious in response. “The main target is 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The talks about 2025 will be held at a later date. At the moment, we all are working and learning under Nitish Kumar,” he said.
Lalu Yadav and Nitish Kumar, friends at times and bitter rivals at other times, have dominated Bihar’s political landscape since 1990s when Yadav became Bihar’s chief minister. In 2005, Kumar dislodged RJD from power and has been Bihar’s CM since then, barring a brief interlude when he relinquished the chair and installed his protege Jitan Ram Manjhi in 2014.
Meanwhile, the opposition in the state, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which was ousted from power in the state after CM Kumar’s party left it for the RJD and others in August this year, said it was all too know. “It was only a matter of time,” said state BJP president Dr Sanjay Jaiswal.
