Bihar’s air was thick with anticipation of Nitish Kumar’s return to the BJP-NDA fold for the past few days and a flurry of major political parties’ meetings hinted something’s cooking.
On Sunday, speculations became a reality when Kumar submitted his resignation as the CM to Governor Rajendra Arlekar in the presence of Vijay Kumar Sinha, the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in Bihar Assembly and Bihar BJP chief Samrat Choudhary. The Janata Dal (U) chief along with leaders of BJP, Hindustan Awam Morcha (HAM) and an Independent MLA stake claim to form the government again, the second “u-turn” by Kumar after the 2020 state assembly election.
Nitish Kumar, who has been the Chief Minister of Bihar since 2005, except for eight months in 2014-15, was sworn in as the CM for the ninth time in his political career on Sunday evening.
Kumar, who was dubbed “Paltu Babu” and “Paltu Kumar” by BJP leaders after he dumped the party in 2022 to join the Mahagathbandhan, recently praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for honouring former Bihar CM Karpoori Thakur with Bharat Ratna.
It may be noted that the BJP and its allies JDU and LJP swept 39 parliamentary seats out of 40 in Bihar in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and the alliance returned to power with a majority in 2020 state assembly polls.
A look at Nitish Kumar’s political career in Bihar Politics
1985: Nitish Kumar elected to the Bihar Assembly
1998: Nitish Kumar allied with the BJP and served in the NDA government under AB Vajpayee in various capacities as the Railway and Agriculture Minister
2000: With BJP’s help Nitish Kumar became the Chief Minister for the first time on March 3, 2000. However, he resigned after seven days, before the vote of confidence in the Assembly as he did not have the majority.
2003: The Samata Party merged with Janata Dal and Nitish Kumar was elected as the chief.
2005: The JDU-BJP alliance crossed the majority mark in state assembly elections. Nitish Kumar took oath as the Chief Minister of Bihar for the second time.
2013: Nitish Kumar broke ties with the BJP after Narendra Modi was appointed as the Chairman of BJP’s Lok Sabha election campaign committee.
2014: Nitish Kumar resigned from the CM post, taking moral responsibility of the JDU’s defeat in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The JD(U) got only two Lok Sabha seats out of 40 in Bihar.
2015: Nitish Kumar joined hands with his former ally Lalu Prasad and formed a grand alliance with the Congress. The alliance had swept the 2015 assembly elections.
2017: After two years in the Mahagathbandhan, Kumar took another U-Turn and dumped Mahagathbandhan to form the government in Bihar.
2022: Nitish Kumar dumped the BJP again to form the government with Mahagathbandhan.
2024: Nitish Kumar ditched the Mahagathbandh to form the government with the support of BJP and other NDA allies, months ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
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