Nitish-Lalu juggernaut rolls on

When the year 2016 began, Nitish Kumar had hardly completed 50 days in office after his third consecutive landslide win in Assembly polls in November 2015.

Majority of the political pundits in the country had then predicted an imminent premature downfall of the Grand Alliance government in which Lalu Prasad’s RJD was the biggest partner.

The assumption was primarily based on a propaganda unleashed by the BJP-led Opposition that the ‘return of Jungle Raj’ (akin to the lawless regime of the 1990s) would discredit Nitish and tarnish his assiduously-cultivated image of ‘Sushan Babu’ (the man who established the rule of law).

The common perception among such people was that Nitish would either dump Lalu midway or quit in a huff as he is known to brook no nonsense. Nothing of that sort happened.

Neither Lalu interfered in the functioning of the government, nor Nitish allowed anyone else to call the shots in the government in which the Congress was also a junior partner.But the bonhomie among the Grand Alliance leaders did not mean Bihar never hit the headlines for the wrong reasons.

 In fact, the year started with a ruling party legislator, Sarfaraz, being charged with outraging the modesty of a fellow woman passenger in Rajdhani Express train. Nitish immediately suspended the accused JD (U) legislator, who is RJD MP Md Taslimuddin’s son.

Nitish had to face further embarrassment when an RJD MLA Raj Ballabh Yadav was charged with raping a minor.

Reiterating umpteen times that “rule of law prevailed in Bihar and was applicable to all, no matter how high and mighty he or she is,” Nitish ensured the legislator was put behind bars.

Later, when the accused lawmaker obtained bail from the Patna High Court, the Bihar government moved the Supreme Court, following which the apex court sent the RJD MLA back to jail.

But the most controversial episode of ‘bail and jail’ was that of former RJD MP Md Shahabuddin, languishing in prison on several kidnapping and murder charges.

The controversial RJD strongman from Siwan let loose a reign of terror in his fiefdom after coming out of jail. Nitish’s critics predicted Shahabuddin episode would help develop cracks between the two ruling alliance partners, but Nitish again proved sceptics wrong.