Bihar election results 2019: Nitish Kumar eyeing role of NDA convener?

PATNA: The results of the Lok Sabha polls in Bihar have brought contrasting results for the two protégés of socialist icon Jaya Prakash Narayan — Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar. While Lalu’s RJD has been decimated, Nitish’s JD(U) won 16 out of the 17 seats allotted to it in the NDA seat-sharing.
For all practical purposes, Nitish had the highest stake in this Lok Sabha elections, and his gamble paid off with his party getting the highest tally ever in the Lok Sabha polls.
Back in 2015, ahead of the Bihar assembly elections, Nitish had said: “Mitti Mein Mil Jaynge, Par BJP Me Wapis Nai Jayenge” (I’ll prefer to be destroyed rather than go back to BJP). But in less than two years, he returned to the NDA fold proving the adage on politics right: There are no permanent enemies, and no permanent friends, only permanent interests.
Though Nitish had said on Tuesday that JD(U) will join the NDA cabinet if voted to power, party insiders, ally BJP and political observers are of the view that he will remain confined to Bihar. The Narendra Modi-led NDA government did not have a single JD(U) leader in the cabinet in its first term.
However, after the NDA’s impressive performance in the state, party insiders say his stature has now increased and, hence, Nitish may consider playing a bigger role in national politics. “Nitish Ji will remain the CM of Bihar and he is the only CM candidate of NDA in the state in 2020 assembly elections. However, he might consider playing a bigger role in national politics. He has good relations with many non-NDA leaders, including Telangana CM KCR and Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu among others. So, he may be given the responsibility of being the NDA convener and act as a bridge between the NDA and other parties,” said a senior functionary of JD(U).
Nitish, who had formed two consecutive governments in Bihar along with BJP in 2005 and 2010, severed his party’s 17-year-old ties with BJP in 2013 over the nomination of Narendra Modi as NDA’s PM candidate. JD(U) fought the 2014 Lok Sabha elections alone and managed to win just two seats.
A year later, he entered into an alliance with his bite noir Lalu Prasad’s RJD and Congress ahead of the 2015 state polls and the Mahagathbandhan logged a massive victory winning 178 of the 243 seats against 58 of NDA, which comprised BJP, LJP, RLSP and HAM (S) back then.
However, Nitish ditched his foe-turned-friend Lalu to return to NDA in July 2017. He cited corruption charges against Lalu family for his decision to leave the Mahagathbandhan as well as the need for a “double-engine” government at the Centre and state for joining NDA.
Despite returning to the NDA fold, Nitish tried to keep his secular credentials intact by articulating his party’s difference with BJP and the Narendra Modi government on issues like Article 370, Citizenship Bill, Triple Talaq and Ram Mandir among others.
Nitish’s ability to bargain hard was seen ahead of the Lok Sabha elections when he managed to make the saffron party agree to a 50:50 seat-sharing ratio in Bihar. Accordingly, both BJP and JD(U) contested 17 seats each, while Ram Vilas Paswan’s LJP contested the remaining six seats in the state.
Again, true to his political unpredictability, after the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha polls the issue of special category status for Bihar, which the party had made its main poll plank in 2015 assembly elections, was raised by senior JD(U) functionaries.
In another development, which raised eyebrows, Lalu claimed in his recently published biography that Nitish wanted to come back to Mahagathbandhan within six months of getting back to NDA.
However, with JD(U) riding on ‘Modi-tsunami’ in Bihar, political observers said he is unlikely to make any unpredictable moves ahead of the assembly elections.
State BJP functionaries, too, are of the opinion that Nitish will continue to remain as Bihar CM. “JD(U) is an important ally in the NDA and they will get their due representation in the new government NDA at the Centre. But as far as Nitish is concerned, he most likely to continue to be in Bihar only, because he enjoys much higher sovereignty here,” said a senior functionary of the BJP.