New Delhi, April 14
The Gujarat Chief Minister’s prime ministerial ambition suffered a setback today when his Bihar counterpart Nitish Kumar made it clear that the Janata Dal (United) would not accept at any cost the projection of Narendra Modi as the NDA’s nominee for the country’s top executive’s job.

Without directly naming Modi even once during his 45-minute speech at the JD-U National Council meet here, Kumar firmly told the BJP leadership that his party would walk out of the NDA, should it name the Gujarat CM as the alliance’s candidate for the prime ministership.

What surprised political observers was the fact that Kumar did not make any reference to the Congress party or the UPA during his lengthy address and concentrated mainly on Modi bashing.

The JD-U, the second largest constituent of the NDA after the BJP, also adopted a political resolution, giving a clear deadline to the saffron party to name the alliance’s nominee for the Prime Ministership by the end of the year.

The Bihar strongman, who has time and again indicated his opposition to Modi’s candidature by questioning the latter’s secular credentials against the backdrop of the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat, had last night met BJP President Rajnath Singh and senior party leader Arun Jaitley and apparently conveyed to them his views on the Gujarat CM in an unambiguous manner.

As the JD-U wound up its two-day meeting, Kumar minced no words in articulating his position that there would no compromise with the BJP on the basic issue of secularism for the sake of power. He said the JD-U alliance with the BJP had withstood the test of time over the last 17 years after three contentious issues —common civil code, Article 370 of the Constitution and Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid — were put on the backburner.

“We want to walk together on the same path. But if there is an attempt to derail us from that path, nobody knows what will happen tomorrow.”

While he was scathing in his attack on the Gujarat CM, Kumar was all praise for former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee for the manner in which he ran the NDA coalition at the Centre by taking every party along. “To run this country, we need a leader who has the vision of Vajpayee jee.

The PM should be someone who can keen the country united and ensure inclusive growth.” One would have to wear a cap also, he said, recalling indirectly that Modi had refused to wear the cap offered to him by a Muslim.

Nitish Kumar, however, was quite careful to ensure that his comments against Modi did not lead to speculation that he wanted the NDA to project him for the PM’s post. “We don’t harbour any illusion that we can be projected for the PM’s post. We are a small party and we don’t want to meet the fate of Deve Gowda, Gujral or Chandrashekhar but we have a role to play and we will.”

Earlier, the JD (U) unanimously re-elected Sharad Yadav as the party’s National President for the third consecutive time.