Nitish Kumar - A Saffron Crown

It’s not the jubilant return six-time CM Nitish Kumar might have hoped for. Big brother BJP is likely to be the real power behind the throne

- Amitabh Srivastava

Nitish Kumar should be a happy man. He proved wrong scores of opinion polls which had predicted that he would be swept away by the perceptible undercurrent of anti-incumbency. The results of the hard fought Bihar assembly election showed that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) headed by Nitish secured a slender majority, thwarting a determined challenge by the mahagathbandhan (MGB) led by young Tejashwi Yadav, the son of his old political rival Lalu Prasad Yadav. It ensured that Nitish would be sworn in for a fourth consecutive term as chief minister of Bihar (all in all, the seventh time).

Yet, hours after the victory, barring a thank you tweet to voters from the official handle of his party, the Janata Dal (United) or JD(U), there was silence from Nitish about the outcome of the elections. This was strange, given that his alliance partners, particularly the BJP, were making a big show of celebrating the victory. Indications were that Nitish was unhappy with his own party’s performance, apart from his grouse at the way the BJP had handled some key issues during the campaign. It seems Nitish wanted to lay down the ground rules for his seventh stint before agreeing to be sworn in as chief minister of a new NDA government.

BJP, THE BADA BHAI