Bhagwat at the conference in New Delhi on Thursday. (AFP)

New Delhi, Aug. 9: RSS sarsanghchalak Mohanrao Bhagwat has placed Bihar ahead of Gujarat as a model for “good governance”, in what appeared to be a tactical move.

Asked during an interaction with the foreign media in Delhi why he had given precedence to Nitish Kumar’s Bihar over Narendra Modi’s Gujarat, sources present quoted Bhagwat as saying: “People say this about Bihar all the time, so my individual opinion shouldn’t count.”

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief did not elaborate.

Bhagwat then put the BJP-ruled states of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh on the “good governance” list and added that “parts” of Maharashtra were also looked after “well”.

In June this year, Bhagwat had defended the Gujarat chief minister, albeit obliquely, after his Bihar counterpart had rejected Modi as a prospective candidate for Prime Minister because of his “anti-secular” baggage.

Nitish had also insisted that the NDA declare a prime ministerial candidate before the 2014 elections. Read together, his assertions implied that the BJP could not consider Modi as a probable Prime Minister.

Once Bhagwat wondered aloud at a closed-door meeting of “swayamsevaks” at a training camp in Maharashtra why a “Hindutwadi” could not become Prime Minister, the BJP picked up the cue, ended its reticence and backed the Gujarat leader in the face-off with Nitish.

The BJP-Nitish equation hit a rough patch thereafter, and sources in both sides thought the alliance, that runs the Bihar government, would unravel in a matter of time. Especially after the Janata Dal (United) split ranks from the NDA to back Pranab Mukherjee in the presidential election.

However, back-room negotiators on both sides started to salvage the alliance once the BJP and the Dal (United) figured out that it might not help either to fight solo, at least not in the foreseeable future.

Nitish helped matters by announcing support for Jaswant Singh in the election for Vice-President, notwithstanding the fact that he had batted for Hamid Ansari as a presidential candidate.

BJP chief Nitin Gadkari reciprocated the gesture by assuring him over dinner that the NDA would elect its prime ministerial candidate as a coalition and his party would not do anything unilaterally.

Sources said Bhagwat, on his part, did not wish to utter anything that could “vitiate” the BJP-Dal (United) relations again. “The Sangh too has realised that if the BJP has to enhance its individual tally (in 2014), a good showing in Bihar is a must and that is achievable only if the alliance with Nitish stays,” a BJP source said.

Had Bhagwat, “even mistakenly”, ranked Gujarat as number one and Bihar second, the media’s “spins” might have unsettled equations in the NDA, the sources said.

The BJP’s keenness to humour Nitish was reflected in the responses of its spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain today. Speaking to the media in Patna, Hussain clarified that as one of the NDA’s “top” leaders and as the head of the Bihar coalition government, Nitish’s opinion on who the coalition’s Prime Minister would be will “hold much significance”.

On Wednesday, in Patna, Nitish had said he would back “another” BJP leader (other than Modi) for the country’s top post. “I will disclose my cards at the appropriate time and forum,” he told the media.

Bhagwat’s interaction with the foreign media was the first such by an RSS chief. It is learnt that Bhagwat’s media advisers had proposed he would like to meet non-Indian journalists.