Nitish Kumar and (top) Narendra Modi

Patna, Dec. 24: Bihar chief minister and key NDA ally, Nitish Kumar, has set out qualifiers that appear to rule out his Gujarat counterpart, Narendra Modi, taking over as head of the alliance at the Centre. “Any leader of a future alternative to the Congress would have to have two essential attributes, a programme and acceptability,” Nitish told The Telegraph in an exclusive conversation during the Saharsa leg of his Seva Yatra last fortnight.

“Any leader who does not possess wider acceptability, across sections of society and alliance partners, will not be workable.” There probably lies a subtler message in this than just making future leadership a no-go zone for Narendra Modi. Nitish is also sending a message to the BJP, the core of the NDA, that allies like him will have to have a major say in critical decisions, especially if the NDA were to be in a position to form the government. On current rating, Nitish is billed to be the largest NDA component other than the BJP.

Nitish brought up no names and declined to discuss individuals who might or might not make the cut for leadership, saying even speculating on the issue would be premature and hypothetical. The only one he mentioned during the conversation was himself, and that was only to rule himself out as a contender. “My ambitions lie in whatever I can do for Bihar, there remains a lot to be done, be sure I am not entering any other race, so there should be no room for speculation,” he said.

But beyond the speculative and the hypothetical, Nitish’s analysis of the course of national politics towards the next elections seemed to suggest that in order to contend for power in 2014, the NDA would need to stitch up a broader coalition, essentially with regional parties. It was in this context that he laid down leadership requirements which Narendra Modi doesn’t measure up to. The Gujarat chief minister has been widely credited, like Nitish, for foregrounding governance and development, but his acceptability outside Gujarat remains low. Especially among those regional parties that pride their secular credentials and don’t wish to scare away the minority voters.

Nitish himself has displayed a touchiness on the Modi issue that borders on the pathological. The key, though unstated, clause to his partnership with the BJP in the state is that Modi will play no part in it. The Gujarat chief minister has remained unwelcome in Bihar, even for election campaigns, and on the one occasion that he did go there — to attend a party convention in mid-2010 — the alliance nearly came apart owing to a provocative advertisement placed in local newspapers crowing about ascendant Gujarat’s flood-relief aid to backward Bihar.

Although Nitish has never spelt it out, he is said to view Modi as a communally divisive leader whose politics frighten the minorities. He has kept Bihar out of bounds for Modi because he believes the Gujarat chief minister threatens the support base Nitish has slowly but surely created among Bihar’s Muslims. Often, when asked about Narendra Modi, Nitish has jestfully pointed in the direction of his deputy chief minister, Sushil Modi, and remarked: “Hamare yahan ek hi Modi kafi hai. (We are happy with just one Modi).”

But Nitish may not be alone in apprehending that a possible grab for central leadership by Modi will have its downside.

In the wake of Modi’s widely publicised “sadbhavana” fast — seen as a preparatory ritual for a larger stage — sections in the BJP itself had voiced concerns about the implications of Modi making a takeover bid. “We need to expand the NDA beyond what we currently are,” a senior party leader said, “but I am not sure what impact Modi at the helm will have on widening the alliance.”

A section in the BJP feels Nitish Kumar will be more credible as alliance builder in comparison to Modi, should the BJP or the NDA fall short of numbers. Nitish, though, is not biting that bait, at least for the moment. “How many times am I to underline that I am not a contender for any job other than the Bihar chief minister, which I already am. This is where my work is,” he said, when asked if he would consider the possibility of heading a coalition at the centre.