With weeks ahead of the Assembly polls, Bihar Chief Minister and JDU supremo Nitish Kumar has sparked a fresh debate over his mental health after a viral video showed him insisting on garlanding a female candidate during a poll rally in Muzaffarpur's Meenapur constituency.
In the video, the 75-year-old leader is seen insisting on garlanding Rama Nishad, the BJP candidate from Aurai constituency.
In local Hindu traditions, a woman cannot let anyone except her husband put a garland around her neck.
Nishad, who had joined the BJP last week, was seen squirming when Kumar moved towards her with the garland in his hand.
JD(U) working president and Kumar’s close aide, Sanjay Kumar Jha, hurriedly tried to prevent the CM from creating a scene by grabbing his hand. Kumar briefly lowered it, but then suddenly garlanded the woman.
Appearing irked by Sanjay Kumar Jha's attempt to stop him, the CM said into the microphone, "Ee gajab aadmi hai bhai (What a strange man)."
Earlier, during his speech at the rally, Kumar prefixed "Shri" to the female candidate's name. He also mispronounced the name of JDU candidate Ajay Kushwaha.
Reacting to the video, RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav repeated concerns regarding the CM's mental health.
"Ee gajab aadmi hai bhai. If the Chief Minister is healthy, why is he behaving like this after reading a written speech?" he wrote in a post on X.
The RJD leader has been raising concerns regarding Kumar's health, questioning his ability to govern the state.
Earlier, sharing a similar video where Kumar appears to be greeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi repeatedly, Tejashwi speculated that the CM's aides might be spiking his food.
"Can this mental state of the Chief Minister be blamed on his close aides who may be spiking his food at the instance of alliance partner BJP?", Tejashwi Yadav asked.
"For quite some time, the Chief Minister has been behaving in a manner that shows he is not in the proper state of mind. He has made crude remarks about my mother Rabri Devi, a former Chief Minister, and women in general. Once he was caught on camera fooling around while the national anthem was being played in the background," he said.
"Clearly the Chief Minister no longer has the ability to run his government. A syndicate is calling the shots and it will be exposed soon," he charged.
(With inputs from PTI)