Patna, Jan. 22: Both chief minister Nitish Kumar and his prime political rival Lalu Prasad share the trait of having a strong bond with their native place. For Lalu, Phulwaria in Gopalganj remained a birthplace. But Nitish turned Kalyanbigha in Nalanda into his workplace.

Unwinding remained the prime objective of Lalu’s every visit to Phulwaria. But each time Nitish went back to Nalanda, he meant business.

Nitish appears to be fond of either beginning or ending his ventures at his native place. He has chosen Nalanda — his native district — to conclude the first phase of his Seva Yatra that started from north Bihar’s West Champaran district on November 9.

The chief minister had launched his much-vaunted Harit Bihar Kranti (Green Bihar campaign) by planting trees in Kalyanbigha, his ancestral village in the district, on August 2011.

In fact, Nitish’s rise in politics is strongly rooted to his native soil. Kalyanbigha, where he was born, and Bakhtiyarpur, the nearby bazaar where he got the primary education, turned out to be a laboratory for his foray in politics. He has always chosen his native constituencies — Lok Sabha or Assembly — to contest from in over 30 years of his political career.

Lalu’s bond with his native place, on the other hand, is limited to emotional attachment. He has seldom tried his poll luck from his home constituencies. He contested from different seats to the north and south of the Ganga to reach the Assembly or the Lok Sabha.

The RJD chief hit the portals of Lok Sabha for the first time winning the Chhapra seat in 1977. He lost it subsequently and then won the Sonepur seat in 1980 to become an MLA.

In over 35 years of his legislative career, Lalu has contested from Raghopur and Danapur Assembly constituencies besides Saran and Madhepura — a Lok Sabha seat far away in the Kosi region of north-east Bihar. He also contested unsuccessfully the Pataliputra seat, one of the two Patna seats, in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls.

But Nitish stuck to his native place despite initial setbacks. At the beginning of his political career, he lost in two successive Assembly elections in 1977 and 1980 from Harnaut, his home constituency. But he stuck to Harnaut and become an MLA for the first time in 1985. Later, he kept on winning his native Barh and Nalanda Lok Sabha seats till he became the chief minister to settle down in Patna in 2005.

The first place that Nitish visited with his wife Manju Devi (alive then), his mother Parmeshwari Devi and other family members after taking oath as the chief minister in November 2005 was Kalyanbigha.

Lalu had also visited Phulwaria and touched the feet of his mother, Marajia Devi, after becoming the chief minister in 1990. But he treated his village as a place for escape, recreation and unwinding. Even after becoming chief minister or Union minister, Lalu would go to his village and ask for sattu, saag and other eatables to share with his villagers. He constructed a magnificent temple of goddess Kali, set up referral hospitals, block office and railway halt at his village. But Phulwaria remained his janmbhoomi (place of birth).

Observers attribute the contrasting relationship of the two leaders with their native place to three broad reasons. First, Nitish belongs to a political family. His father, Ramlakhan Singh, was a freedom fighter and a senior Congress leader. He got his initial lessons in politics in family and the local milieu in which he lived. He came to Patna to attain higher education and to leapfrog on political ladder from the steppingstone that his native ambience had given him.

Lalu, on the other hand, hails from a literally indigent family. He moved to Patna in 1950 with his cattle-raising and milk-selling elder brother when he was a toddler. He became an adult from adolescent at his brother’s cattle-shed and learnt lessons in politics in Patna-based schools, colleges and universities.

Still, he has a deep bond with his native place — but it is apparently emotional that manifested in his way of living and speaking. Contrary to him, Nitish’s politics stayed rooted to his native soil. As usual, Nitish will have a night halt in Nalanda and will conclude the first phase of Seva Yatra after meeting the people in Nalanda tomorrow.