Amit Shah on BJP-JDU conflict in Bihar: During a Dussehra event at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan, none of the top Bharatiya Janata Party leaders in the state were seen on the stage with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. The noticeable absence triggered talks of a rift between alliance partners BJP and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United). Questions were raised if the alliance could remain intact till the Assembly elections due next year.

However, BJP president Amit Shah has put to rest all such speculations making it clear that the coalition is doing fine and it will certainly contest the state polls under Nitish Kumar’s leadership. While deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi had been saying that the NDA is intact and Nitish is the leader under whom elections will be fought, this is for the first time that BJP top brass has endorsed the JD-U president’s role.

“The Janata Dal (United) and the BJP will go to polls together and we will fight polls under the leadership of Nitish ji. This is absolutely clear,” Amit Shah told News18 in an interview.

Responding to a question about reported fissures between the two parties, he said difference of opinions are always there within a coalition. “Bas matbhed manbhed mein nahi badalna chahiye (these differences in opinion should not result in a change of heart),” Shah added.

The JD-U has reportedly been miffed with the BJP after it was offered just one ministerial berth in the new Modi cabinet. Nitish Kumar had then refused to join Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s team in New Delhi. In what was seen as a retaliatory move by Nitish Kumar a few days later, he expanded his cabinet but without including any BJP MLA.

More recently, Union Minister and BJP MP from Begusarai Giriraj Singh had hit out at the state administration for the unprecedented floods in Patna city. “Both Nitish Kumar and Sushil Modi are responsible for what happened in Patna after the heavy rains,” Singh had said. “One who gets applause for good work, must also take responsibility in case of poor performance,” he added.