Patna: Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday hinted that new districts would be created in Bihar.

He was speaking at a meeting held in Bagaha, a sub-division of West Champaran district, around 270km northwest of Patna, on the first day of his Samiksha Yatra.

Nitish declared during his speech in Bagaha that some new districts would be created and Bagaha would be one of them. He, however, did not provide any timeframe for the creation of new districts.

Bagaha, located 60km from the district headquarters town Bettiah, is a police district because it is located near the forests on the India-Nepal border - an area where dacoits once reigned supreme.

The problem of dacoits roaming around has largely been curbed, but administration-wise it still is a sub-division.

The demand for making Bagaha a full-fledged district has been a long-pending one.

Currently, Bihar has 38 revenue districts and two police districts - Bagaha and Naugachhia, a part of Bhagalpur district - where a superintendent of police-rank official is posted.

The two police districts have been create for the sake of better maintenance of law and order.

Naugachhia lies across the Ganga in Bhagalpur district.

The last new districts to be created in Bihar was in the 1990s when under the Lalu Prasad-Rabri Devi regime Sheohar district was carved out of Sitamarhi under the political pressure of then minister Raghunath Jha, and Arwal - which was then a part of Maoist-affected Jehanabad district.

However, residents of Bagaha are not the only ones demanding a full-fledged district.

People of Rajgir in the chief minister's home district of Nalanda have repeatedly demanding district-status.

They have been pointing out that Rajgir was once the capital of the Magadh empire.

"If Nitish Kumar carries out his promise, Rajgir will surely figure in the list of new districts," a senior state government official said under cover of anonymity because he is not authorised to brief the media.

"Nitish himself had admitted that Rajgir is the place he wants to visit frequently and a lot of projects like electronic city and a world-class stadium are in the pipeline there," the official added.

Apart from Rajgir and Bagaha, there are places like Barh, a sub-division of Patna district, and Forbesganj in Araria district where residents have been demanding full-fledged district status.

Officials point out that creation of new districts should be aimed at better administration as it increases the establishment costs of governance because more government employees and government buildings like a full-fledged district magistrate's office and district hospital have to be created.

Some other officials, who spoke under cover of anonymity, also felt that creating new districts is like opening a Pandora's box and leads to rise in demands when people of various blocks demand to be made sub-divisions and sub-divisions demand to be made districts.

Such a decision, the officials said, always has a political fallout.