The Assembly on Tuesday passed the amendment bill to the law that governs the Mahabodhi Mahavihara with a voice vote though the BJP staged a walkout accusing the government of playing votebank politics.

Amendment to the Bodhgaya Temple Act, 1949, proposes to drop its Section 3 (3), warranting upon the state to nominate a Hindu as the Bodhgaya Temple Management Committee chairperson in the event the Gaya district magistrate (DM) is not from the majority community. The Gaya DM is the ex officio chairperson of the committee.

Chief minister Nitish Kumar, supporting the bill moved by Vijay Kumar Choudhary, said: “The amendment is truly in accordance with the secular spirit of the Constitution…. A district magistrate is caste-and-community neutral and as such, the religion and caste of a DM should not prevent him from holding the position to run the affairs of an institution so important for Buddhists from across the world and other tourists.”

“The chief minister in a bid to appease a particular community is opening the temple committee’s ex officio chairman’s position to a non-Hindu and non-Buddhist DM that amounts to fiddling with a hornets’ nest and disturbing religious amity,” said leader of Opposition Nand Kishore Yadav.

RJD leader Abdul Bari Siddiqui suggested the committee should have all Buddhist members.

University laws

The Bihar State University (Amendment) Bill 2013, Patna University (Amendment) Bill, 2013 and Nalanda Open University (Amendment) Bill, 2013 were passed with a voice vote.