Bihar’s ruling JD(U) is now witnessing the beginning of a turmoil whose roots lie in chief minister Nitish Kumar’s recent bold anti-corruption initiatives. The party’s Rajya Sabha member Uprendra Kushwaha, once very close to Mr Kumar, has stirred up a hornet’s nest after being targeted by some leaders.
Mr Kushwaha, a former Leader of the Opposition in the Bihar Assembly who holds considerable influence on the state’s Koeri community, was seriously miffed when two party colleagues — state unit president C.P. Sinha and spokesman Niranjan Kumar Pappu — alleged that his assets had grown by “369.89 per cent” in the past few years. Mr Kushwaha threatened on Wednesday that he would sit in a dharna on January 24 unless Mr Kumar’s JD(U)-BJP government orders a probe into his assets by that date.
“If a probe into my assets is not ordered despite my requests, I will have no other option than to sit in a dharna with this demand. I request the chief minister to save me from the character assassination taking place,” said Mr Kushwaha, a JD(U) national general secretary who has had a love-hate relationship with Mr Kumar in the past few years despite their caste-based and ideological affinities.
Mr Sinha and Pappu had alleged that Mr Kushwaha’s “behaviour and his declarations before the Election Commission” proved that had entered politics to amass wealth. “While his assets were worth `46.63 lakhs in during the February 2005 Assembly polls, they rose to `2.92 crores in 2010,” said the two leaders on Tuesday.