Patna, Sep 18 (PTI) JD(U) president Nitish Kumar and his son and heir apparent Nishant Kumar on Friday made their maiden appearance together at a party function where parliamentarians and legislators got a crash course on public life.
Kumar, who stepped down as Bihar chief minister in April, weeks ahead of his son’s entry into politics, inaugurated the day-long orientation programme.
Nishant, 44, who is a minister in the BJP-led government formed after his father’s resignation, was among the handful of leaders who shared the stage with Kumar at the ‘Karpoori auditorium’ inside the JD(U) office.
Slogans were raised by attendees in praise of the father-son duo. Nishant joined his father when Kumar was lighting a lamp.
According to JD(U) national spokesperson Rajiv Ranjan Prasad, the orientation programme, conducted by PRS Legislative Research, was aimed at helping members of both Houses of Parliament and state legislatures take part in debates and discussions in a more effective manner.
There had been speculations in a section of the media that the meeting had been called to announce “big” decisions like renaming the party as ‘JD(U)-Nitish’ and Nishant taking over as the national president, in place of his septuagenarian father.
However, Prasad made it clear that there was no proposal, as of now, to replace Kumar as national president, while Deputy CM Vijay Kumar Chaudhary, a former state president of the party, said a proposal to rename the JD(U) could be moved only at the meetings of its national executive and national council.
Later, a statement issued by the party said attendees of the programme also received pep talks from Nishant, JD(U) national working president Sanjay Kumar Jha and state unit chief Umesh Kushwaha.
Nishant urged the attendees to draw inspiration from his father’s “zero tolerance for three Cs – crime, corruption and communalism” and stressed the need for informing the public of “good work done by the NDA government in the last 20 years”.
Jha said the orientation programme was proof that “we are a serious and responsible party which believes in upgrading its workers’ skills, unlike our opponent which got its cadres to wield sticks dipped in oil”.
The allusion was to the ‘tel pilavan lathi ghumavan rally’ organised by the RJD in 2003 when it was in power in the state, with founding president Lalu Prasad’s wife Rabri Devi as the Chief Minister. Lawlessness witnessed on the streets of Patna during the rally is often raked up by the NDA to allege that “jungle raj” had prevailed in Bihar.
Kushwaha, in his speech, showered praise on Nishant and said that with his entry into politics, “we feel that we are in safe hands”. After the orientation programme, don-turned-politician Anant Kumar Singh vented spleen against MLC Neeraj Kumar, vowing to “defeat” the latter in upcoming legislative council polls.
Neeraj Kumar contested as JD(U) candidate from Mokama, Singh’s pocket borough, in 2015 when the latter had quit the party and retained the seat as an Independent.
Senior JD(U) leaders, however, sought to downplay the outbursts of Singh, pointing out that he was a maverick and that elections had not yet been announced and the party was yet to take a decision on the seats to be contested and candidates for the same.
Elections are to be held for eight seats of the 75-strong Upper House. PTI NAC BDC MNB
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