Patna: RLSP chief and Union minister Upendra Kushwaha created a flutter within the NDA on Wednesday when he said chief minister Nitish Kumar should step down and make way for a new face as candidate for chief minister for the 2020 Assembly elections.

"Fifteen years is a long time. Now Nitish Kumar should step down and make another person the chief ministerial candidate for the NDA," Kushwaha, the Union minister of state for human resource development, said on Wednesday.

Kushwaha, who was speaking to a TV news channel, said he believed Nitish should move on to playing a larger political role, but he didn't specify what.

"Any leader seeks an opportunity to demonstrate his capabilities. Nitish ji has demonstrated that in 15 years. I know him very closely. I believe he himself will announce that he will not be a contender in 2020," he said, adding: "This is my personal view. We should give the opportunity to any other leader. He (Nitish) can play a bigger political role."

Asked about his own chief ministerial ambitions, Kushwaha said every politician was keen to play that role and there was nothing wrong in it.

Kushwaha's statement triggered strong reactions from the Janata Dal United.

JDU secretary-general K.C. Tyagi said the RLSP was a marginal political party and its leader was not even able to keep his small party united. "Nitish Kumar is and will continue to be the face of the NDA in Bihar," Tyagi asserted.

Kushwaha's comment comes at a time when the BJP and the JDU have sparred over who would be the NDA's face for Bihar and also over seat-sharing for the Lok Sabha polls. The issue was understood to have been sorted out during BJP president Amit Shah's visit to Patna on July 12.