Snap ties, BJP dares Bihar partner

A day after the Bihar chief minister returned Rs 5 crore to  Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, it was the turn of Bihar’s Modi––Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi––to rebuff Nitish. Nitish too cancelled a public meeting at Patna Sahib, the Assembly constituency of BJP leader and Health Minister Nand Kishore Yadav.

Making his displeasure over Nitish’s “arrogant behaviour” obvious, Modi on Sunday cancelled the tour where he was supposed to address a joint meeting with Nitish at Paliganj. “I don’t want to accompany Kumar for the meeting. The CM has exhibited his arbitrary attitude in returning the flood relief money to the government of Gujarat,” a fuming Modi told reporters. His decision follows the growing clamour within the BJP to sever ties with the JD (U) for “constantly disrespecting Narendra Modi and the people of Gujarat.”

Sushil Modi, who has enjoyed a harmonious relationship with Nitish for the last four-and-a-half-years, is expressing his annoyance publicly for the first time since 2005. Taking a hardline, senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha said what Nitish Kumar has done is a “childish act” and that if the chief minister does not want to continue the alliance, “let him clearly announce it.”

Bihar BJP chief Dr CP Thakur admitted on Sunday that the “relationship between the two parties was no more cordial.”  If things worsened, he said, the BJP might go it alone in the assembly polls. Thakur’s statement is significant in the backdrop of the meeting of the central BJP leadership on Monday.