Cold shoulder to JP lieutenant

Sushil Kumar Modi launched a verbal attack on chief minister Nitish Kumar for virtually joining hands with the Congress at a meeting of the BJP on June 25 to condemn Emergency, but the name of BJP MLA Vikram Kuer was missing from the speakers’ list.uer played an active role in Jaiprakash Narayan’s agitation against the move of late Indira Gandhi on the same day in 1975. He was one of the 11 members of the students’ steering committee, which decided the strategy for the agitation. Kuer was agitated finding his name missing from the speakers’ list. “Modi took part in the JP Movement but other speakers were either not born then or were too young to remember it,” he said, wondering how a 35-year-old could become a part of JP’s agitation. “In Bihar, there is a record of 45-year-old people getting the benefits of freedom fighters,” said another BJP leader.

Kushwaha scare

Former JD(U) MP and president of Rashtriya Lok Samata Party Upendra Prasad Kushwaha is in news again. After the BJP-JD(U) alliance snapped, few BJP supporters claimed that he would join their party. “Upendra has a good hold over the Kushwaha caste in the state. The Kushwahas are the second largest block in the OBC after Yadavs. He may swing the Kushwaha votes. But the problems are he keeps insisting that he should be projected as the chief minister and would demand at least 45 seats for his supporters,” said a senior BJP leader of Bihar. If the state BJP leaders had their way, they would not allow Kushwaha to enter the party. “But the problem is he is negotiating with the party’s central leaders,” said a former BJP leader.

Number compulsion

The police firing at Bagaha touched the nerves of chief minister Nitish Kumar. “He reportedly called the inspector-general and the superintendent of police of the area and scolded them for giving the opposition an opportunity to get at him. He reminded them that his government had a slender majority in the Assembly,” said an official. The separation with the BJP appears to have changed the attitude of the chief minister towards the governance. “Before the split, he used to contact either the director-general of police or the home secretary after such incidents. But now he is going down to the SP. RJD chief Lalu Prasad also spoke with SPs in such situations,” recalled a senior police officer.

Wannabe ministers miss Patil

The JD(U) legislators aspiring to be ministers were dejected after learning that Governor D.Y. Patil would not be in the state for over two weeks from June 27. It’s not that they have an emotional relationship with him. “The absence of the governor means the expansion of the ministry would not happen in the near future,” said a JD(U) MLA, who fancies himself to be a minister after the expansion. An old-timer recalled that the impending expansion of the Rabri ministry was widely discussed in the private meetings of politicians, especially by RJD MLAs. “The discussions lasted for six months before the actual expansion,” he added.