Nitish Kumar

On the current situation of Bihar, Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai, in an interview to IANS, said: "Bihar is heading towards Jungle Raj and the leaders of Mahagathbandhan are responsible for it. Murders, rapes, dacoities are the common affairs in Bihar. People are miffed with the current rulers of Bihar. People will reply to them in the next elections."

The Centre has invited Chief Ministers of all north and east Indian states including West Bengal's Mamata Banerjee, Bihar's Nitish Kumar, Uttar Pradesh's Yogi Adityanath and others. Sources have said that Banerjee is scheduled to participate in this event but Nitish Kumar will skip it.

In the new year, Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United chief Nitish Kumar will intensify his campaign of achieving opposition unity.

Sources have said that he met Nitish Kumar in a closed-door meeting as well in presence of the Chief Minister's trusted bureaucrats. The Nitish Kumar government is facing criticism over the state's law and order situation, following a rise in murders, rapes, loots of jewellery shops, illegal manufacturing, smuggling and sale of liquor, in the last few months.

Over 1,000 people have lost their lives in hooch tragedies and state exchequer is losing Rs 30,000 crore as revenue per year, the BJP claimed. Though Chief Minister and JD(U) President Nitish Kumar always takes credit of liqior ban in the state, whenever a hooch tragedy occures, he puts the onus of it on every political party which supported the Bill in the Legislative Assembly.

He also targeted the BJP leaders, and said, "BJP leaders should go in public and make people aware about the benefits of liquor ban in Bihar." "Liquor ban in Bihar was not my decision. Every party supported the law and then it was implemented. The women of the state had a strong demand for this law and it has benefitted a large section of the society," Nitish Kumar said.

"Nitish Kumar is irrelevant in the politics of Bihar. He does not have a vote bank of any community. Hence he is repeatedly promoting Tejashwi Yadav for future elections," Chaudhary said. As Nitish Kumar and Tejashwi Yadav went to Nalanda for the inauguration of the dental college on Sunday, Chaudhary said that the dental college is not constructed completely.

"I have no ambition to become Prime Minister of the country. I have only one ambition: to defeat the BJP and remove it from the Centre. We all are working on it and we will contest the 2025 Assembly election of Bihar under the leadership of Tejashwi Yadav," Nitish Kumar said.

The statement of Nitish Kumar came at a time when the opposition BJP claimed that the state government is losing revenue in crores due to the liquor ban. Kumar's alliance partners Jitan Ram Manjhi, patron of Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) and Ajit Sharma, CLP leader of the Congress party, also demanded the withdrawal of this law.

"Now, we have a seven party government in Bihar and we will jointly develop the state. Lalan Singh is the national President of the party and I ask all of you to support him," Nitish Kumar said. Nitish Kumar's statement came soon after the defeat of his candidate in Kurhani bypoll, and its timing is important for the RJD and other parties from the Mahagathbandhan's point of view.