Nitish was elected to the Rajya Sabha unopposed on March 16. He resigned from the state legislative council as per the rules. The Prohibition of Simultaneous Membership Rules, 1950, prohibit membership in both Parliament and a state legislature at once. Tejashwi Yadav, RJD chief and Leader of Opposition in the Bihar Assembly, claimed that JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar resigned as MLC under pressure from the BJP. He claimed that the BJP had cheated Kumar as well as the people of Bihar once it came to power in the state.