'RJD searching for excuses to postpone Bihar polls': Deputy CM Sushil Modi

Taking a dig at the RJD, Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi said it was looking for excuses for the postponement of assembly polls and likened it to "ill-prepared students unwilling to appear for examinations".

“The NDA will follow the decision of EC, whether the assembly polls are held on time or not. We are ready for any kind of situation, but as ill-prepared students are unwilling to appear for examinations, RJD, looking at its potential loss, is searching for excuses to postpone the polls,” he said in a tweet in Hindi on Saturday.

Sushil Modi, in an earlier tweet which he deleted, had mentioned “some political parties” instead of naming RJD, which was latched onto by the Congress to claim that he was targeting LJP and that the BJP was giving a raw deal to its ally.

Congress MLC and AICC spokesperson Prem Chandra Mishra, in a video message, alleged that the “ill-treatment” meted out to Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) is now evident.

“It is just a matter of time before the NDA disintegrates in Bihar,” he said.

Mishra has been, for some time, holding out an olive branch to the LJP leadership, reminding the party about its old association with the Congress during the UPA regime wherein the party founder had held a cabinet berth.

Commenting on the latest developments, BJP state president Sanjay Paswan told reporters, "NDA is intact and raring to go. We will fight together and defeat our rivals.” The LJP, however, has not reacted to the episode even though NDA sources said the "slip up" from the deputy CM came at a delicate time when Chirag Paswan, son of Ram Vilas Paswan, was sulking over getting short shrift from Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his Janata Dal (United) (JD-U).

Kumar is said to be skeptical about setting aside a sizeable number of seats in the assembly polls for the LJP, which had contested six out of 40 seats in the Lok Sabha elections and won them all.

Moreover, the LJP has also been feeling slighted over the chief minister's reluctance to accommodate the party in the state cabinet ever since it lost its sole berth upon Pashupati Kumar Paras, Chirag's paternal uncle, getting elected to the parliament.

The LJP, which has been with the NDA since 2014, hopes that the BJP will intervene and help it get its due, in recognition of the party's steadfast support to the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The BJP, however, is said to be in a fix since it values LJP, but also realises that after the Shiv Sena parted ways with it in Maharashtra, the JD(U) is its oldest and most prominent ally in the state.

Image Credits: PTI