Bihar situation worsening, govt not under Nitish Kumar's control: LJP

Bengaluru: Alleging that the crime graph in Bihar was surging, Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) leader Chirag Paswan has said Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was clearly not in control of the government and the apprehensions of return of "jungle raj" were coming true.

"We had discussed in our core party meeting (recently) that - will it be too early to demand President's rule or resignation of the Chief Minister (Nitish Kumar) because every alternate day someone or the other is getting killed in our state...We can't really wait for things to get better now," LJP Parliamentary Board Chairman said here yesterday.

Paswan, a Lok Sabha member, said Nitish Kumar also cannot be given the benefit of doubt because he has vast experience and had been Chief Minister for three terms. He also alleged that the killings clearly showed that Nitish does not have control, and RJD supremo Lalu Prasad was directly running the coalition government in Bihar.

"He (Nitish) is the Chief Minister, and I don't know what is stopping him to check these kind of incidents (killings). This clearly shows he (Nitish) has no control over the government, and Laluji is directly running it," he said.

Paswan, the son of Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan, said, "The crime graph in Bihar is on the surge, and we did not expect things to get worse so soon. So, whatever our apprehensions of return of jungle raj have come true, which we had predicted soon after Laluji joined hands with Nitishji to form government." 

Asked how long the government would last, Paswan claimed his party does not see it surviving not more than two years as there has been "verbal arguments" between Lalu and Nitish.

For instance, Paswan said, there has been arguments between the two over Prime Minister Narendra Modi's surprise visit to Lahore in Pakistan recently. "The way Nitishji appreciated Prime Minister for his Lahore visit, and the way Laluji criticised it, clearly shows they are not on the same platform," he said.

Paswan also said they were not natural allies for a very long time and were against each other...today they have joined hands to come back to power in our state and to stand against BJP, LJP and NDA," he added.