Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday held back-to-back rallies in Bhojpur and Nawada districts followed by a mega roadshow in Patna, but the talking point became the absence of chief minister Nitish Kumar at the event in the state capital with just four days left for Bihar to vote in the first phase of the Assembly elections .

The PM's roadshow in Patna, a BJP stronghold for decades, predictably drew massive crowds. Later, Modi posted on X, thanking the people of the city for their "affection and blessings".

The Opposition pounced on the absence of chief minister and JDU president Nitish Kumar at the roadshow. BJP state president Dilip Jaiswal and Union minister and JDU leader Rajiv Ranjan Singh aka Lalan accompanied the prime minister instead.

RJD leader and the Opposition’s CM face, Tejashwi Yadav, on Monday said he was not surprised at Nitish's absence, stating that it is evident as the BJP has no plans of making the JDU chief CM again.

"Everyone knows that the BJP will not make Nitish Kumar the chief minister," ANI quoted Tejashwi as saying.

Tejashwi has time and again claimed that the NDA is sidelining CM Nitish. He had earlier alleged that the CM "might not even be aware" of the contents of the NDA's manifesto.

Congress leader Kanhaiya Kumar said the Congress party and he himself had pointed to the differences within the BJP JDU combine.

“They tried this in 2020 through Chirag Paswan. The plan did not work out. Now they are trying again,” Kanhaiya told The Telegraph Online.

Kanhaiya said the BJP had modified its strategy in Bihar from the one they had used in Maharashtra to break Shiv Sena.

“In Maharashtra they took control of Eknath Shinde first and then broke the party. In Bihar they have captured the JDU and are now using it to finish Nitish Kumar. Everything points towards an unease in the BJP-JDU camp but the media keeps talking about the Mahagathbandhan (the opposition alliance comprising the Congress, RJD, the Vikassheel Insaan Party and the Left),” he said.

Kanhaiya said the indications of the rift in the BJP and the JDU were evident even before the election schedule was announced.

“Amit Shah said the MLAs will choose the leader after the election results. The BJP and JDU have not yet made public their seat-sharing arrangement. Lastly, the Prime Minister recently said Bihar’s real development will start after NDA gets its own chief minister,” Kanhaiya said.

RJD leader Misa Bharti said that BJP doesn’t need Nitish Kumar, but it needs “Nitish Kumar’s vote bank…”

“The message is clear. After 14th November, the chief minister will not even be publicly visible among NDA leaders..." RJD MP Sanjay Yadav told IANS.

At an election rally at Sonbarsa in Saharsa district on Monday, Congress’s Lok Sabha MP from Wayanad Priyanka Gandhi said, “Every decision is taken from Delhi. If your CM is not heard, how will your problems be heard?”

According to sources in Patna, Nitish Kumar’s campaign plan was already fixed that he would not return to the Bihar capital on the night of November 2. Instead, he would continue his election tour the next day from Madhepura.

The JDU has denied any rift and said the chief minister remains fully committed to the NDA’s campaign. Party leaders said Nitish Kumar has already shared platforms with the Prime Minister during this election and will continue to do so in upcoming rallies. They stressed that his absence from the Patna roadshow is purely due to a scheduling issue, not political disagreement.

BJP MP Manoj Tiwari said, “Nitish Kumar had other plans but Lalan Singh was present to represent JDU.”

“Such claims are nothing but daydreams and mere imagination. It is the NDA that will form the government, and Nitish Kumar will once again become the Chief Minister of Bihar,” Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi told PTI.

BJP leader and actor-singer Pawan Singh said, "People will keep talking, but our NDA family is on the path of development — we do what we say. Bihar's progress over the last fifteen years, is a visible difference in development" between then and now."

Bihar is voting in two phases for the assembly elections - November 6 and November 11 - while the counting of votes is scheduled to take place on November 14.