Not returning to RJD, made that mistake twice: Nitish

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Friday (September 6, 2024) rubbished speculation of joining hands with the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) again and said that he had “made a mistake twice” and will not repeat it. Speculation of Mr. Kumar jumping ship has been rife ever since he met RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav at the Secretariat.

The Janata Dal (United) chief issued the statement while sharing the stage with Union Health Minister J. P. Nadda, also the national president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Nitish Kumar switches sides yet again, takes oath as Bihar CM

“I made the mistake of going with them (RJD) twice. Now I will not go anywhere. We (NDA) have been together since 1995, whereas they (RJD) did not do any work. However, they keep getting space in the newspapers of Bihar and Delhi,” Mr. Kumar said after inaugurating and laying the foundation stone of various projects of the health department worth ?850 crore at the Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences.

Earlier this week, Mr. Kumar and Mr. Yadav had met at the Secretariat for around half-an-hour setting off speculation of another switch.

The JD(U) leader has a history of flip-flops, having done it four times. Mr. Kumar first switched sides in 2013 by breaking a 17-year-long alliance with the BJP. In 2015, he fought the Assembly elections in alliance with the RJD. However, following allegations of corruption against Mr. Yadav, he broke the alliance in 2017 and returned to the NDA. Mr. Kumar fought the 2019 Lok Sabha and 2020 Assembly election with the BJP but in 2022, he quit the NDA and joined hands with the RJD. In January 2024, Mr. Kumar left the RJD and formed the government with the BJP.

Mr. Kumar said when he first came to power in 2005, there was shortage of doctors, medicines and facilities in government hospitals. “Just 39 patients used to come to primary health centres every month. When we came to power, hospitals started giving free medicines in 2006. Now, more than 11,000 patients come to primary health centres every month,” he said.

Praising the Bihar Chief Minister, Mr. Nadda said he is confident that the State “will progress under the leadership of Nitish Kumar”.

“It is a happy coincidence that in 2019, when I was the Health Minister, I had laid the last foundation stone of the health institute in Bihar in the presence of Nitish Kumar. Today, after becoming the Health Minister again, I am doing the first inauguration on this land... Whatever achievements we are seeing in the health sector in Bihar, it started from 2005,” Mr. Nadda said.

Before taking part in the event, Mr. Nadda met Mr. Kumar at his official residence along with other leaders of the Bihar BJP including both deputy chief ministers Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha, and Bihar BJP president Dilip Jaiswal.