Union minister RCP Singh, who was recently denied another term in the Rajya Sabha by the Janata Dal-United he formerly headed, should "heed the message" and resign from the Union Cabinet, a key political aide of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has said.
JD-U parliamentary board chairman Upendra Kushwaha was responding to queries by reporters about Singh, whose Rajya Sabha term expires in July. As per rules, a minister can occupy the post for a maximum period of six months unless he or she gets elected to either House of Parliament.
"There is no technical problem as such if he (Singh) continues in his chair. But if he heeds the message and reads the political situation, it would be nice if he resigns," Kushwaha told reporters.
A former Union minister himself, Kushwaha made it clear that he was not "offering any advice nor expressing any wish" but was "merely stating what is the most appropriate course of action".
Asked what responsibilities Singh, a former national president, was likely to be given in the JD-U if he gave up his Cabinet berth, Kushwaha said dismissively, "It is for him to decide. The party has other things on its agenda."
About the expulsion of a number of perceived "RCP supporters", including party spokesperson Ajay Alok, the JD-U leader on Tuesday said, "This makes it clear that nobody is above the party. Anybody who does not follow the party line will face the consequences."
Singh, who is perceived to have grown too close to ally Bharatiya Janata Party, is said to have miffed Kumar by not taking the latter's consent before accepting a ministerial berth at the Centre. Kumar has been opposed to "token representation" being given to allies by the BJP which enjoys a brute majority in the Lok Sabha.
Singh's induction into the Narendra Modi cabinet came a few months after the 2020 assembly polls in which the JD-U's tally plummeted, mainly because of the rebellion by the LJP then led by Chirag Paswan. The BJP came out with a tally far greater than that of the JD-U, for the first time since the alliance came to power in 2005.
The JD-U has since been working overtime to send across the message that diminished numbers in the assembly notwithstanding, the party and its leader were not pushovers.
In a related development, the JD-U has also come out with a detailed statement rebutting state BJP president Sanjay Jaiswal's contention that Bihar was lagging behind in development because of unchecked population growth.
The statement, issued jointly by JD-U spokespersons Neeraj Kumar, Nikhil Mandal and Arvind Nishad, made no mention of the BJP or Jaiswal, but rued "the bad name being given to Bihar by repeated talks of population growth".
The statement asserted that Bihar had fared better than most states in checking population explosion ever since Kumar assumed command.
It also questioned the link between high density of population and progress which Jaiswal had sought to establish in a lengthy Facebook post last week and cited the example of densely-populated Kerala which is noted for its exemplary performance in terms of human development.
The JD-U statement also railed against "dushprachar" (malicious campaign) against "a particular religion", highlighting "almost equal fertility rates among both Hindus and Muslims".
It also pooh-poohed the suggestion, made explicitly by Jaiswal, that those with two children or less be provided with incentives in government jobs, pointing out that a similar proposal was rejected in 2000 by the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government at the Centre which chose to focus more on health and education, like the Nitish Kumar administration has been doing in the state.
The JD-U statement also said that in 2017, the Narendra Modi government also discontinued special increments given to those who adopted family planning measures observing that the people had become sufficiently aware of the need for population control.
