I did not seek milk from RJD nor sugar from BJP: Upendra Kushwaha

Kushwaha said everyone should get equal share of the "kheer", apparently hinting at just and fair seat-sharing among the NDA partners in Bihar.
Union Minister Upendra Kushwaha (File | PTI)
Union Minister Upendra Kushwaha (File | PTI)

PATNA: Union minister and RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha on Monday sought to put to rest fresh speculations that he was getting ready to quit NDA and ally with RJD, saying his statements about “delicious kheer” were misconstrued.

“What I suggested by the ‘delicious kheer’ statement was that we are trying to gather the votes from every section of society so that Prime Minister Narendra Modi wins a second term after the 2019 polls,” said the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) chief.

His words brought relief to NDA, but RJD, Bihar’s main Opposition party, insisted that Kushwaha was feeling suffocated in NDA and would switch over to the RJD-led grand alliance right before the Lok Sabha polls next year.

“If milk from the Yaduvanshis (Yadav community) and rice from the Kushwahas get mixed, kheer can be prepared,” Kushwaha had said in his address at a function on Sunday to mark the birth centenary of BP Mandal, a former Bihar CM who also headed the Backward Classes Commission (Mandal Commission) that recommended 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in jobs.

Kushwaha’s words were widely viewed as his sly indication that he may disassociate his party from NDA and join the grand alliance. Speculations about a political realignment in Bihar have been doing the rounds since the time JD(U), led by CM Nitish Kumar, rejoined NDA after snapping ties with the grand alliance in July 2017.

The RLSP chief is understood to be unhappy with top BJP and JD(U) leaders because they have refused to fulfill his demand for eight seats for his party to contest in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Known for his antipathy towards Nitish Kumar, Kushwaha had said on July 25 that he does not want the JD(U) president to be projected as NDA’s next CM candidate for the Assembly polls in Bihar due in 2020. Kushwaha had questioned Bihar’s law and order system earlier this month after a local leader of his party was shot dead.  

Even as he asserted that his reference to Yaduvanshis did not mean RJD, Kushwaha displayed his soft corner to RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, saying: “I am not among those who criticise even Prasad's shadow and create tension in the society”.

Related Stories

No stories found.
The New Indian Express
www.newindianexpress.com