Vying for Bihar’s Muslim votes and sensing the challenge thrown up by the Congress, chief minister Nitish Kumar has presented another picture of Centre-state confrontation over the Congress-led UPA government’s reported rejection of the Bihar government’s proposals for development of madrasas in six Muslim-dominated districts.
Like Mr Kumar’s heightened demand for special category state status for Bihar during the Lok Sabha polls, the issue of development of madrasas is likely to help the ruling JD(U) in the Assembly polls due in November. JD(U) leaders are upbeat that the latest confrontation would prove the icing to the cake of “great goodwill” the leading party in Bihar’s ruling NDA coalition has already earned among the state’s 1.4 crore Muslims by its grandstanding during the recent tiff with partner BJP.
Mr Kumar chose a large convention of backward Muslims — the Pasmanda Adhikar Sammelan, organised mainly by JD(U) Rajya Sabha member Ali Anwar Ansari in Patna on Wednesday — to declare that the central ministry of minority welfare had rejected the state government’s proposals for six Muslim-dominated districts. The Centre had approved last year the state government’s proposals only for the Muslim-dominated Kishanganj district, now represented in the Lok Sabha by a Congress MP.
“This shows the mentality of the Congress, which wants to keep Bihar’s Muslims backward and deprived,” said Mr Kumar, lashing out at the Congress for the poverty and lack of opportunities faced by the country’s Muslims. Significantly, Mr Kumar was speaking at the first convention of Muslims after the JD(U) and the BJP came on to a collision course last month over the controversial Narendra Modi advertisements.
With the Congress in Bihar being led by a Muslim leader, Mehboob Ali Kaiser, the JD(U) is evidently worried about a possible dent in its Muslim vote bank.
, especially because of the BJP’s insistence on bringing Mr Narendra Modi to campaign in Bihar.
In his bid to woo the Muslims, Mr Kumar had recently announced that financial support would be provided to all the 2,700 unaided madrasas in Bihar, which are affiliated to the Bihar State Madrasa Education Board but have not been getting any financial aid from the government till now.