A day after his newly formed NDA government won the trust vote in the State Assembly, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on February 13 expressed confidence in the ruling alliance winning big in the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.
“Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, NDA will win all the Lok Sabha seats and over 200 seats in the Assembly polls in the State,” he said while speaking to the motion of thanks for the Governor’s address. Bihar has a total of 40 Parliamentary and 243 Assembly seats.
Mr. Kumar further said that both “BJP and JD-U would work together for the development of Bihar”. “We’ve been working together for the State’s development since 2005, barring two occasions when I had parted ways with the BJP.”
Pointing towards Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) leader Jitan Ram Manjhi, Mr. Kumar recalled that Mr. Manjhi too had been a Chief Minister for nine months and “works [for the development of the State] were done smoothly”.
He then criticised the previous RJD government, headed by party chief Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi. “What was happening before 2005? Nothing. People were afraid of coming out of their homes after sunset; there was no road,” he recalled, adding that women could now step out even at 10-11 p.m..
“About the government’s work since 2005, the Governor had said everything in detail in his address. We’ve done a lot of things for the development of the State,” he asserted. He reiterated the government’s commitment to providing 10 lakh people with government jobs., and added that 5.33 lakh people had already benefitted from the effort.
Looking at the NDA legislators, he said that there was no need to “look here and there”. “You will win the elections as the government is committed to provide opportunities to all sections of society,” he said.
He assured them that he was back with his old ally and that he now would “remain with it forever”. “Since we (NDA) have been working together for a long time, the State would prosper in the coming years,” Mr. Kumar said.
The Chief Minister was visibly upset when an Opposition member raised the slogan “Nitish Kumar murdabad” even as he was delivering his speech. “They are raising slogan as they wanted to kill people and we are doing good works and media too should know about this,” he said.
Published - February 13, 2024 07:59 pm IST
