Union Steel Minister R.C.P. Singh on Monday said that the chance of Bihar Chief Minister and his JD-U's chief Nitish Kumar becoming the country's Prime Minister are remote.
"A party needs to have 273 seats for a stable government and the Prime Minister of the country. JD-U is a party of Bihar which won a maximum of 20 Lok Sabha seats once. The current strength of JD-U in Lok Sabha is 16. So how would he (Nitish Kumar) become the Prime Minister of the country?" he asked.
When reporters gave the example of H.D. Deve Gowda, Singh said: "What was the tenure of Deve Gowda? His tenure was very short. We need not to register only the name of Nitish Kumar in the list of Prime Ministers. He was the longest serving Chief Minister of Bihar and he has been running a strong and smooth government."
Singh served as a Rajya Sabha member for two consecutive terms representing the Janata Dal-United. As his relation with Nitish Kumar was not so good, the party did not field him again and nominated its Jharkhand unit President Khiru Mahto.
Mahto filed his nominations in the Assembly in presence of Nitish Kumar, JD-U national President Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh, Upendra Kushwaha, as well as BJP leaders Sanjay Jaiswal, Nityanand Rai, Tar Kishor Prasad, Shahnawaz Hussain.
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The nominations of BJP's Satish Chandra Dubey and Shambhu Sharan Patel were not filed on Monday due to the incomplete paper work. They will file their candidature on Tuesday, the last date.
After nominating Mahto, Nitish Kumar said: "He (RCP Singh) needs not to resign from the Union Cabinet immediately. There is a certain time for him. He has already talked about it."
Singh earlier said that he will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and that "it is the special privilege of the PM to retain him further after he is no longer a member of any house of the Parliament".
