Patna, June 8 (IANS) The stage is set for Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United (JD-U) leader Nitish Kumar and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi to share the dais once again at BJP’s two day national executive meeting in Patna June 13, an year after they shared a platform in Punjab.
Modi is visiting Bihar for the first time after the Nitish Kumar-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government came to power in the state four and a half years ago, to attend Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) ‘Bihar Swabhiman’ rally in Patna June 12-13.
The Nitish Kumar government has made Modi a state guest along with former BJP president L.K. advani, during his visit here. Besides, Nitish Kumar would host a dinner for the BJP leaders.
Aswan Kumar Choubey, senior BJP leader and in-charge of the national executive meeting, told IANS that the party was confident that Nitish Kumar will address the rally to send a message ahead of the state assembly polls due in October-November.
‘We will request Nitish Kumar to address the rally,’ Choubey said.
Another senior BJP leader said that if Nitish Kumar addresses the rally, he will have to share the stage with Modi, who will be the star of the rally.
This would be the first time after the May 11, 2009 BJP rally in Ludhiana, an industrial city in Punjab, that Nitish would be sharing the dais with Narendra Modi.
Before the Ludhiana rally, Nitish Kumar had stated that he would not share the stage with Modi. But Nitish Kumar and Modi had sat in the front row on the same stage with top NDA leaders during the rally in Ludhiana.
‘Nitish Kumar’s stand on Modi was a political gimmick. People saw that Nitish Kumar greeted Modi when he came on the stage and the two clasped each other’s hands and briefly spoke to each other,’ Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Ram Kirpal Yadav said.
Congress leader Prem Chand Mishra recalled that Nitish Kumar had opposed a move by a section of BJP leaders to propose Modi’s name for the prime minister’s post but said it was for public consumption.
‘Nitish Kumar’s public stand on Modi is not real,’ Mishra said.
BJP is an alliance partner of Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal-United in Bihar but Kumar has time and again publicly tried to disassociate himself from Modi for his alleged role in communal riots in Gujarat in 2002.
Nearly one and a half months ago Nitish Kumar had said that BJP leaders Narendra Modi and Varun Gandhi were not needed for campaigning for the next assembly elections in Bihar.
The state JD-U president Vijay Kumar Choudhary, however, made it clear that the party has no problem with Narendra Modi’s visit to the state to attend the national executive meeting of the BJP.
‘We have absolutely no problem with Modi visiting Bihar to take part in his party function,’ he said.
A rebel JD-U leader Lalan Singh said that Narendra Modi had wanted to attend Nitish Kumar’s swearing-in ceremony as chief minister in 2005, but senior JD-U leaders, including Sharad Yadav, counselled the BJP not to do so as it would send a wrong signal.
Political watchers here said that Nitish Kumar’s move to project himself as a secular leader, who did not want to share the stage with Modi, was to garner support of nearly 17 percent Muslim population in Bihar.
The BJP is holding its national executive meeting in Patna which will be attended by top leaders of the party including party president Nitin Gadkari, former president L.K. Advani, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Narendra Modi, Varun Gandhi, Rajnath Singh and Murli Manohar Joshi.
