Nitish aides fuel speculation of him contesting Lok Sabha from UP

Fresh speculation of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar contesting Lok Sabha polls from adjoining Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled Uttar Pradesh have left the ruling Mahagathbandhan in Bihar and the saffron party, in opposition in Patna, at each other's throat.

The speculation was triggered after Shravan Kumar, a Bihar minister, who is also the Janata Dal-United's in-charge for UP, said there were 'demands' that the party boss enter the fray from the adjoining state.

"I was recently in Jaunpur and there are very strong demands that honourable chief minister consider fighting Lok Sabha polls from UP," Shravan Kumar had told a regional news channel on Wednesday.

Bijendra Yadav, the most senior member of the cabinet and a former state JD-U president, told reporters at the party office, "Not just Uttar Pradesh, but our units in many other states want the chief minister to contest from there. Of course, it is a decision for the leader to take."

Notably, shortly after Kumar had quit the National Democratic Alliance last year, vowing to defeat the BJP-led coalition in 2024, intense speculation had arisen that he could fight elections from Phulpur, famous in history as the seat of Jawaharlal Nehru.

The seat, which covers a major part of the city of Prayagraj, earlier known as Allahabad, has a sizeable population of Kurmi caste, to which Kumar belongs, and is just about a 100 km from Varanasi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's constituency.

Shravan Kumar, however, said, "It is not just Phulpur. During my recent UP visit, I got the sense that there are many other seats, including Fatehpur and Pratapgarh, where our party wants the CM to fight. They feel it will create a buzz across the state."

The JD-U's allies in Bihar seem to have little problem.

Congress legislature party leader Shakil Ahmed Khan said, "Why not? When a person from Gujarat can contest and win from Varanasi, then we are so close to Uttar Pradesh."

Notably, despite the seat's association with Nehru, and after his death Vijaylaxmi Pandit, Phulpur has slipped from the grip of Congress which last won it in 1984, riding the wave generated by Indira Gandhi's assassination.

Rashtriya Janata Dal spokesman Shakti Yadav, when asked about what he thought of Kumar contesting from UP, said, "If the people of that state so wish, he must. It is a matter of pride for Bihar that our leader's popularity transcends Bihar's boundaries."

Interestingly, while Kumar has denied any prime ministerial ambitions, his efforts to galvanise the entire opposition notwithstanding, the prospects of his playing a 'national role' enthused not just the JD-U but also the RJD, which views it as deputy CM Tejashwi Yadav's pathway to the highest seat of power.

Meanwhile, the BJP was predictably annoyed at the talk of Kumar making a foray into UP, which not just sends the PM to Lok Sabha and has the highest number of seats, but is also ruled by Yogi Adityanath, seen as the party's rising star.

Leader of the opposition in Bihar assembly Vijay Kumar Sinha and state unit chief Samrat Choudhary came out with separate, strongly worded statements, alleging that Kumar had lost his popularity on his home turf and would face humiliation if he moved to the adjoining state.

The two BJP leaders, who have been miffed at Kumar scoring a point with Patna high court's thumbs up to the caste survey ordered by his government, accused his party of thinking in terms of 'caste arithmetic' in UP where JD-U has never been a force to reckon with.