JOIN USOnly a miracle can save the alliance: JDU
Even as the 17-year-old alliance between the Janata Dal (United) and the BJP is gasping for breath, the elder partner has maintained that only a miracle could save the coalition in Bihar.
The JD (U) national spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member Shivanand Tiwary categorically said that “after the BJP imposed Narendra Modi on us, only a miracle could now save the alliance.”
Tiwary added that the onus of split will lie on the BJP as Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had always been in favour of a secular nominee as NDA’s prime-ministerial candidate. But the BJP’s elevation of Modi as its campaign manager is diametrically opposite to Nitish’s principled stand.
And what Nitish has said (Dua detein hai jeene ki, dawa karte hain marne ki: They pray for our life, but provide medicines for death) clearly shows that there is now little room left for this alliance to continue.
“Ab kuch miracle ho jaye to aur baat hai (If some miracle happens, then it’s a different matter altogether),” said Tiwary while responding to a specific query whether there was still any scope for reconciliation.
Nitish should be grateful to Advani: BJP
Now that the divorce between the JD (U) and the BJP seems inevitable, the saffron camp has started making veiled allegation against Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and has even reminded him that it was actually BJP patriarch L K Advani who helped him become the CM for the first time in 2000.
The BJP, hoping against hope for a reconciliation, has avoided going whole hog against the JD (U) strongman but has reiterated that even though George Fernandes was against the decision to appoint Nitish as Bihar CM in 2000, it was Advani who helped Nitish quit as Union Minister (he was in Vajpayee’s Cabinet then) and don the mantle of Bihar’s chief-ministership.
“That he could not muster enough numbers to prove his majority in the undivided Bihar Assembly and had to quit as CM within seven days is altogether a different story. But no one can deny that it was Vajpayeeji and Advaniji who helped his coronation, even though the BJP then had more MLAs than Nitish’s party (then called Samata Party),” said one of the most vocal BJP legislators and a key member of Rajnath Singh’s team Rameshwar Chourasia.
“Who is Nitish to decide who should be our leader? Have we ever suggested who should be the leader of the JD (U) legislature party? Or will he ever accept if we make such demand?” Chourasia continued his tirade.
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