Allies mistrust Nitish ‘pullout’

Aug 10, 2012 - ANAND S.T. DAS |

Age Correspondent

Patna

Bihar chief minister and JD(U) stalwart Nitish Kumar’s renewed public pronouncement of his unwillingness to become India’s Prime Minister has apparently brought neither relief to his uneasy ally BJP nor delight to the ambitious JD(U), which wants to see him in the top post.
Despite Mr Kumar frequently saying that he is content to be leading backward Bihar on the path of progress and that he is not a prime ministerial contender in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, both the JD(U) and the BJP in Bihar have so far placed little real faith in his words. After he openly refused to accept Gujarat CM Narendra Modi as the NDA’s prime ministerial candidate recently, JD(U) leaders began projecting Kumar as “the best prime minister India can have,” while vocal BJP leaders sang praises for Modi, leading to verbal duels between the two allies.
Mr Kumar’s latest assertion, despite sounding more candid and clear than before, has failed to satisfy political observers in demystifying the shape of the JD(U)’s future relations with the BJP. Reiterating his unwillingness to become PM, Kumar said in Patna on Wednesday that the post should go to the largest party in the alliance.

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