With the cold-blooded murder of one of the four abducted policemen by the Maoists on Thursday sending a chill down the spine of Bihar’s police force, the Nitish Kumar government came under bitter attacks from Opposition parties who blamed the chief minister for the policeman’s murder.
Breaking his inexplicably long silence over the hostage crisis for the first time in four days, Mr Kumar on Thursday offered to begin talks with the left-wing rebels and urged them not to harm the policemen taken hostage. But Mr Kumar’s statement came hours after sub-inspector Abhay Yadav was killed by the Maoists following the expiry of the two deadlines they had set with two demands before the government.
Opposition parties like the RJD, LJP and the Congress held Mr Kumar almost personally responsible for the death of Abhay Yadav and the imperilled lives of his three colleagues still in the rebels’ captivity at an undisclosed location in southern Bihar. These parties said the slain policeman could have been saved if Mr Kumar had taken proactive initiatives.
The RJD demanded Mr Kumar’s resignation for “deliberately letting a policeman die”. RJD principal general secretary and Rajya Sabha member Ram Kripal Yadav said: “It was grave indifference to this acute crisis on part of Nitish Kumar that one of the four abducted policeman had to die. He must step down as chief minister immediately”. “The government should have started talks with the Maoists. This government remained fast asleep even when four policemen’s lives were under risk. The most insecure in Bihar today are the policemen. They do not even have the basic facilities promised to them to carry out their duties,” said LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan. Bihar Congress spokesman Premchand Mishra condemned Mr Kumar’s government, saying it “grossly mishandled” the crisis.
Mr Kumar, speaking at a ceremony in Patna to release the “Bihar Development Report,” maintained his typically soft stand on Maoists. I have always said that Maoists are part of our society, and similarly policemen are also part of our society,” he said. I do not think bargaining after holding people hostage is high ideology.”