"WE WILL FORM A NEW GOVT FOR A NEW BIHAR"

On October 27, as the campaign for the first phase of the Bihar election wound down, Mahagathbandhan CM candidate Tejashwi Yadav spoke to India Today TV's Marya Shakil on the poll build-up, his counter to the NDA campaign, the poll promises and how he'll fulfil them. Excerpts:

- Marya Shakil

On the NDA campaign: Well, Prime Minister Modi came, Amit Shah came, central ministers are coming, but no one has explained how they will free Bihar from poverty, migration, unemployment...increase Bihar's per capita income, and how, they might take Bihar to among the top states. Even now, they are in the field campaigning, but not a single word is being said about Bihar's progress. In fact, Shah has said factories and industries can't be set up here due to land shortage...he has clearly stated factories and industries can't be set up in Bihar. Also, remember the 2015 election, when PM Modi had promised to make Bihar an IT hub. Ten years have passed, what happened to the IT hub? And now Shah is saying they will build an AI hub. You can't trust these guys, the NDA is just full of rhetoric.

On the big promise: a government job for every family: Experts say that this will inflate Bihar's salary bill to Rs 6 lakh crore (given that there are 25 million families in the state). But then, last time (when Tejashwi was deputy CM in 2023), they had said the same when we talked of creating 1 million jobs. CM Nitish Kumar, too, had asked how he will create the jobs. Today, those same people are talking about 10 million jobs and giving Rs 10,000 as dole to women. We have worked on the jobs issue with experts and will soon present the blueprint, including how we'll generate revenues, to the people of Bihar.

On friendly fights in 10 seats: That is strategic for us. You see, we had friendly fights in Jharkhand too, and in Jammu and Kashmir. This is in keeping with the internal strategy of the Grand Alliance.