Confident NDA will get two-third majority in Bihar polls under Nitish Kumar: Amit Shah

New Delhi, June 7

Setting the tone for Bihar assembly polls, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, on Sunday, said the state moved from “jungle raj to janta raj” during the NDA rule and expressed confidence that the alliance would get a two-third majority in the state elections under Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s leadership.

Shah’s statement at a first of its kind ‘virtual rally’, in which he addressed the people of the state from the national capital using internet and broadcast mediums, will scotch whatever speculation there might have been over Kumar’s stewardship as a section of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance leaders had been questioning his leadership.

Also read: Amit Shah addresses ‘first virtual rally in history’, insists it is not ‘election’ rally

“Elections are around the corner in Bihar. I am confident that the NDA will form the government under Nitish Kumar’s leadership with a two-third majority,” the senior BJP leader said in the address.

With the Opposition parties attacking the BJP for holding the rally at a time when COVID-19 infection numbers continue to surge, Shah took pains to delink the exercise with Bihar poll campaign, saying it is one of the 75 virtual public meetings that the party had organised for ‘Jan Samvad’ (public dialogue) after the completion of the first year of the Modi government’s second term.

His speech was interspersed with digs at Opposition leaders, including RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, over his absence from Bihar after the COVID-19 outbreak and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi as he highlighted the Modi government’s achievements and strongly defended its handling of the migrants’ issue.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked Chief Ministers to cater to the needs of the migrant workers and also released Rs 11,000 crore for this, he said, adding that the railways had transported over 1.25 crore people to their homes safely after health infrastructure was ramped up to take care of them in their respective states.

With Bihar home to millions of migrant workers and their concern likely to be a key poll issue in the state polls, which are due in October-November, Shah heaped praise on their contribution to the nation’s development and said their hard work is imprinted everywhere.

Some people are doing politics over the issue, Shah said and acknowledged the hardship the migrants have gone through, before taking an apparent swipe at Yadav without naming him. Shah asked if he was in Bihar or “enjoying himself” in Delhi during that period.

Praising Kumar and his deputy Sushil Kumar Modi, who is from the BJP, he said Bihar’s growth rate had reached 11.3 per cent under the NDA rule while it was just 3.9 per cent when former chief minister Lalu Prasad’s RJD was in power.

“Bihar has travelled from ‘lalten raj’ to ‘LED raj’, from loot and order to law and order, from ‘bahubal’ (muscle power) to power of development and from ‘jungle raj to janata raj’,” Amit Shah said.

Listing out several measures, including cash transfer, taken by the Bihar government, Shah said in a lighter vein that while Kumar and Modi had done a lot of work quietly, they lack in doing its publicity.

The Rs 1.25-lakh crore package that Modi had announced for Bihar in 2015 had been executed on the ground, he said, giving details of works in different sectors, such as highways and agriculture.

Targeting Rahul Gandhi, who has frequently questioned the efficacy of the Modi government’s measures, including the lockdown, Shah said somebody sitting here interviewed people in the US while the Prime Minister united the entire country in the fight against COVID-19.

The former BJP president said Opposition leaders dismissed as “political propaganda” Modi’s efforts, be it his call for ‘janata curfew’ or appeal to citizens to beat utensils or light lamps during the COVID-19 crisis to underscore the national resolve and to unite the country, but the nation stood with him and followed him.

Narendra Modi had become the only prime minister after Lal Bahadur Shastri to draw such support from the masses to his appeals, Shah said.

With Gandhi often accusing the government of not doing much for farmers, Shah hit back, saying some NGO had told the Congress leader that speaking loudly would get him more votes.

“Rahul Gandhi claims that the UPA government in 10 years waived loans of Rs 60,000 crore of over three crore farmers. Modi has ensured that over Rs 72,000 crore is given to 9.5 crore farmers every year,” he said.

Highlighting a number of pro-people measures such as free cooking gas and housing schemes of the Modi government, he said the biggest work that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had done was to enhance India’s prestige in the world “to the skies”.

He asserted that Modi has secured the country’s borders.

“There used to be a time when anybody would infiltrate, make light of our borders and behead our soldiers, and nothing happened in Delhi durbar,” he said, adding that the Modi government launched surgical and air strikes after terror attacks in Uri and Pulwama as punitive measures.

Shah’s comments came at a time when the Indian and Chinese armies were involved in a stand-off in Ladakh, with military and diplomatic channels being used to defuse the situation. He, however, made no mention of the issue.

The Modi government also walked out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership as it would have destroyed India’s small farmers, traders and fishermen among others, he said.

Amit Shah said issues which none dared to touch in 70 years were resolved in the first year of the Modi government’s second term and referred to the scrapping of Article 370 provisions and the law against triple talaq.

While previous governments worked to ensure that the Ayodhya issue remained unresolved, the government’s handling of the matter has paved the way for the construction of Ram temple following a Supreme Court judgment, he said.

Citing various steps for the welfare of the poor and the needy taken by the Modi government amidst the fight against the pandemic, Shah asked the Opposition what it did in the states where it is in power besides doing politics.

The BJP claimed that more than 14 lakh internet users joined the first of its kind digital political rally.

The Congress criticised Shah for holding a rally “with politics in mind at a time when people of Bihar were dying due to coronavirus and many were stranded in various parts of the country”. PTI