Bihar : Nitish Kumar-led NDA Wins Trust Vote
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar with NDA MLAs at Bihar Legislative Assembly in Patna on Monday. Image Courtesy: PTI
Patna: Bihar Chief Minister (CM) Nitish Kumar’s new National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government won the trust vote in the Assembly on Monday after Opposition Mahagathbandhan members walked out. This ended days of speculation over some "game" during the trust vote by the Opposition Mahagathbandhan.
Deputy Speaker Maheshwar Hazari, from Kumar’s Janata Dal (United), who presided over the session in the House, announced that the trust vote was carried by a majority vote. In the 243-member House, 129 MLAs voted in favour of the grand alliance. The NDA got support of at least one more vote than it was having in the House.The JD-U has 45 MLAs ,BJP has 79 and HAM has 4 , a total of 128.
According to reports, at least three Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MLAs -- Neelam Devi, Chetan Anand and Prahlad Yadav -- defected to the ruling NDA and voted in its favour. Only one MLA of JD-U did not participated during trust vote and another MLA Hazari was presiding the session so he could not vote. So ,NDA has support of 126 with three 3 RJD MLAs voting for it.
Soon after the session began, Speaker Awadh Bihari Choudhary of the RJD was removed following a motion of no-confidence moved by the NDA. The new Speaker is likely to be a senior BJP leader Nand Kishor Yadav, who will be elected on February 13.
Kumar's JD(U) on January 28 dumped its coalition partners RJD, Congress and Left parties and joined hands with BJP and its ally HAM and formed the new government.
All eyes were on the much-awaited trust vote as rumours of "missing" MLAs of ruling JD-U and its ally BJP as well as opposition RJD were in circulation since Sunday itself.
In his address during the confidence motion, Kumar targeted the RJD and raised his old issue of ‘jungle raj’ in Bihar during the rule of RJD chief Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi. Kumar reminded RJD leader and former deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav that during his ‘father-mother’ rule, there was no rule of law. "Would anybody dare to go out at night at that time,"Kumar said.
Kumar further accused RJD leaders of making money while in power.
But Tejashwi questioned the credibility of Kumar and said that can PM Narendra Modi guarantee that Kumar will not change sides again and how long he will continue in NDA?
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