Nitish and BJP set for confrontation

Bihar chief minister warns he can’t tolerate attempts to disturb communal harmony

Barely seven months after they came together, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his ally the Bharatiya Janata Party, look caught in a confrontation once again.

The fresh cause of tension between the two parties is the alleged attempts by BJP leaders to stoke communal passions in the state resulting in the registering of a case against Arjit Shashwat, son of federal Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Ashwini Kumar Choubey, and seven other BJP leaders by the state administration.

While the state administration holds Arijit responsible for clashes in the communallysensitive Bhagalpur district, the BJP has threatened to launch an agitation if the cases were not withdrawn within two days.

“The BJP leaders have been implicated in false cases,” BJP’s Bhagalpur district unit chief Rohit pandey told media yesterday.

The minister’s son is accused of organising an unauthorised procession in Bhagalpur on Saturday. The procession, which passed through a 15km route that included at least half-adozen Muslim-dominated localities, resulted in clashes that left many injured. Eventually, the state government had to rush central paramilitary forces and ban internet services to bring the situation under control.

That is not the only worry for Chief Minister Kumar who returned to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in July last year after breaking away from the erstwhile ruling Grand Alliance with whose support he had won the last 2015 Bihar state elections.

In the last two days, Kumar has expressed his annoyance over the way some top BJP leaders have been allegedly caught on camera trying to create communal tension.