Anwarul Hoda / PATNA
JD(U) President Nitish Kumar was today sworn-in as the Chief Minister of Bihar for the sixth time and BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi was sworn-in as the Deputy Chief Minister at a simple ceremony in Patna. Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi administered him the oath of office and secrecy at Raj Bhavan.
Yesterday Mr Kumar had resigned as the Chief Minister last evening citing irreconcilable differences with RJD on corruption charges against Lalu Prasad’s son and former Deputy CM Tejaswi Prasad Yadav.
Later, the JDU President joined hands with the BJP to form a new government in the state. He was elected the leader of the JD(U)-NDA alliance at a meeting at his residence. After the meeting, Mr Kumar and Mr Sushil Modi drove to the Raj Bhawan to stake claim to form the new government.
Nitish has claimed support of 132 MLAs, in 243-member State Assembly where 122 MLAs are requited to prove majority. JD(U) has 71 MLAs, BJP 53, RSLP and LJP two each, HAM one and three independents in the alliance. On the other hand, RJD has 80 MLAs, Congress 27 and CPI-ML three.
The Governor has given Mr Nitish Kumar two days to prove majority on the floor of the House.
Earlier in the midnight RJD leader Tejaswi Yadav also met the Governor early to register protest over Nitish Kumar being invited to form the government ahead of the RJD, which is the single largest party in the state. He criticised Mr Kumar for forming the Government with the backing of the BJP.
Mr Yadav’s demand to cancel the oath taking ceremony was rejected by the Governor. Mr Yadav said, he will challenge the Governor’s decision in court.
Meanwhile, RJD, which had sought time to meet the Governor to stake its claim to form the government and was asked to meet him at 11 am, questioned the rationale of asking Nitish Kumar to take oath at 10 am.
“Governor gave us time of 11 am and now suddenly has asked NDA for oath ceremony at 10 am. Why so much hurry & rush Mr. Honest & Moral?” Tejashwi Yadav tweeted.
He said the Governor had initially asked Nitish Kumar to take oath at 5 pm on Thursday.
“Why is the Governor changing his decision in the night. The swearing is taking place at 10 am instead of 5 pm. We are going to Raj Bhavan. We are going to Governor house to stage the dharna if not called for being the single largest party.
“A Governor should act as custodian of constitution, not as Centre’s stooge. He can’t ignore single largest party and largest pre-poll alliance,” Tejashwi said.
He alleged that Nitish Kumar had gone to Raj Bhavan at midnight as half of JD-U MLAs were “in our touch”, he added.
“If Nitish Ji is proud of his moral values and honesty, he would not had been in midnight rush to stake claim for government. Honest man does not fear,” the RJD leader said.
In dramatic and fast-paced developments in Bihar, Nitish Kumar on Wednesday evening resigned as Chief Minister, dumping the RJD and Congress to stitch a new alliance with BJP, which quickly announced support to a new government under him and said it will join it too.
Nitish Kumar ended a 20-month-long grand alliance coalition that defeated the BJP in 2015 and gave his resignation claiming he can’t work in the “current circumstances” following corruption charges against Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav — son of RJD chief Lalu Prasad.