Picture : Twitter / ANI
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has apparently down played his presence at the Iftar party at at the residence of former Bihar CM and Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Rabri Devi in Patna.
Speaking to ANI Nitish said, Many people are invited to such Iftar parties. What connection does it have with politics? We also hold an Iftar party and invite everyone to it,
What caused buzz in political circles was the pictures of the JD-U leader was seen sitting with Tej Pratap and Tejashwi Yadav, the sons of RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav. Other leaders who attended the RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav’s iftar include BJP leaders Awadhesh Narayan Singh and Syed Shahnawaz Hussain and Lok Janshakti Party’s Chirag Paswan.
The chief minister’s presence at the iftar comes at a time when enough indications are there of a rift in the National Democratic Alliance government in Bihar after the RJD’s victory in the Bochahan bypoll.
Nitish Kumar attended the iftar of RJD after a gap of five years. In 2017, Nitish left Bihar’s Grand Alliance to become an ally of the BJP.
Trying to diffuse the tensions in the NDA alliance, the BJP leader and Bihar Minister Shahnawaz Hussain said, “Me and Sushil Modi ji had hosted iftar and Nitish Kumar had also come there. Here, Tejashwi Yadav has hosted one and we were invited, so we have come. There is no need to make any political issue out of this.”
“There is a tradition in Bihar that on iftar all the political parties are invited. So we have also invited Nitish Kumar and he came. We are happy that he came to our party. I think there is no need to make any political issue out of this,” said Misa Bharti.
