Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday tore into the Nitish Kumar-led Mahagathbandhan government in Bihar for “failing to check” communal violence in Sasaram and Bihar Sharif towns and asserted that rioters will be hung upside down if the BJP forms the government in the state in 2025.
Addressing a rally in Hisua in Nawada district, Shah, widely regarded as the BJP’s principal strategist, squarely blamed the Nitish Kumar government for the communal tension that forced him to cancel a scheduled visit to Sasaram, one of the riot-hit towns, earlier in the day.
“Let Prime Minister Narendra Modi return to power in 2024 and help BJP form its own government in the assembly polls which would follow. All the rioters will be hung upside down (‘ulta latka denge’)”, said the Home Minister.
“People of the country have decided that Narendra Modi will become the prime minister for the third consecutive term. Once that happens, Nitish Kumar will go back on his promise of handing over the mantle to his deputy Tejashwi Yadav as his dreams of becoming the PM will be shattered,” he said.
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Shah alleged that Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar have practiced politics of appeasement which has helped terrorism flourish, while Modi has scrapped Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir.
“The BJP can never join hands with Nitish Kumar, who spreads venom of casteism, and ‘Jungle Raj’ pioneer Lalu Prasad,” Shah said, while reiterating that BJP’s doors are always closed for the Bihar CM.
He claimed that Congress, JD(U), RJD, TMC opposed the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, while “one fine morning, Modi laid the foundation of a sky-high temple there”.
On the communal violence in the state, he added, “I pray to God that normalcy returns soon. When I spoke to the governor in the morning, Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh became angry and asked why I was bothered about Bihar. I am the Union home minister and Bihar’s law and order situation is my concern as well.”
Shah, who reached Bihar Saturday evening and held hectic parleys with BJP leaders at his hotel before leaving for Hisua, accused his opponents of “politics of appeasement” which had helped terrorism to flourish.
In an apparent riposte to Nitish Kumar’s repeated complaint that the NDA never agreed to his demand for special status to Bihar, Shah asked the Chief Minister to “spell out what the UPA (Congress-led alliance) which you have now entered did for the state”.
