Mangal Pandey, Sushil Kumar Modi and Nand Kishore Yadav at the rally in Nalanda on Thursday. Picture by Ranjeet Kumar Dey

Biharsharif, July 25: The Bihar BJP on Thursday virtually anointed Narendra Modi as its prime ministerial candidate at a function in Biharsharif — home of chief minister Nitish Kumar.

“India’s first home minister from Gujarat Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had played a big role in making Rajendra Prasad from Bihar the first President. The people of Bihar will return the gesture this time, helping Narendra Bhai Modi to become the Prime Minister,” senior leader Sushil Kumar Modi announced in Biharsharif, the Nalanda district headquarters around 90km southeast of Patna, to the applause of party cadres and supporters.

The party began its much-vaunted programme — Viswashghat ke Khilaf Sankhnad (blowing conch shell against betrayal) — from the Shram Kalyan Kendra ground, incidentally developed by Nitish. In attendance were around 8,000 people.

Though he was not physically present at the venue, the Gujarat chief minister and the BJP poll panel chief’s presence was palpable on Thursday. Posters and banners with large pictures of Narendra Modi, along with Atal Bihari Vajpayee, were put up and his name featured on the lips of every leader who addressed the gathering.

The programme, conceptualised to highlight Nitish’s betrayal of the 2010 mandate to the NDA by dumping the BJP, will be organised in all district headquarters of the state. It is in run-up to the Hunkar Rally scheduled at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan on October 27. Narendra Modi is billed to attend it.

General secretary Shahnawaz Hussain, exhorting people to avenge the betrayal of the mandate, said: “Nitish was behaving like a nirankush badshah (dictatorial king). Such a leader is not good for the democratic health of India.”

But the choice of starting the programme from Biharsharif — Nitish’s bastion — and anointing Narendra Modi as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate seemed an apparent attempt of the party to derive psychological mileage over its estranged-ally-turned- rival.

Sushil Modi, a deputy to Nitish for nearly eight years who had once described him as “prime minister material”, said: “His (Nitish’s) hatred is not only confined to Narendra Modi. He has begun treating Gujarat — the land of Bapu Gandhi and Sardar Patel — as an alien land. He has forgotten that Gujarat too is a part of India.” He, however, failed to establish how Nitish has treated Gujarat as alien.

He played the caste card too, highlighting contributions of Sardar Patel (also the icon of Narendra Modi). Patels are an equivalent to Bihar’s Kurmis — Nitish’s caste men. The former deputy chief minister said: “Narendra Bhai Modi is getting the world’s largest statue of Sardar Patel built in Gujarat for which he has demanded the contribution of iron from all over the country. The BJP will ensure that the people of Nalanda contribute iron in the highest quantity.”