Jitan Ram Manjhi resigns as Bihar CM, claims threat to life

mangaloretoday.com/ IT

Patna, February 20, 2015: Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, who for days remained defiant despite being expelled from the Janata Dal-United, resigned two hours before the crucial floor test in the Assembly on Friday and claimed that he and his supporters were being given death threats.

 

"Our legislators and ministers were given death threats. I told Governor (KN Tripathi) about this," Manjhi told reporters. "I also appealed to Bihar Governor to allow for secret voting, but he said there is no constitutional provision for such an arrangement," he said, claiming that had he been allowed to do so, he would have probed his majority in the Assembly.

"I have been targeted for being a Mahadalit," Manjhi said, demanding fresh elections in the state. Following his resignation, the Bihar Assembly, which had its first day of the Budget session on Friday, was adjourned sine die.

In a briefing marked by a soft stand towards his mentor Nitish Kumar and JD-U ally Lalu Prasad, Manjhi chose to direct most of his anger towards Speaker Uday Narayan Chaudhary. "The Speaker is not working legally. I suspect his conduct," he said. On Thursday, Chaudhary, accepting Nitish Kumar’s demand of giving the JD-U the status of the main opposition party, had appointed Vijay Chowdhary to the post.

Shortly after Manjhi quit, Nitish, who had hand-picked Manjhi to replace him after the JD-U’s poor show in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, reached the Bihar Assembly to meet jubilant legislators supporting him. "Manjhiji should have simply resigned earlier. He quit because he could not succeed in his strategy of breaking the party. The BJP’s game plan is completely exposed today," he told reporters.

RJD chief Lalu Prasad, who has joined hands with arch rival Nitish ahead of the Bihar Assembly elections later this year, said, "He (Manjhi) should have resigned earlier. By getting involved with the BJP, he has ruined his future."

Earlier, senior JD-U leader KC Tyagi told Aaj Tak, "The game that was started by BJP president Amit Shah in New Delhi to unsettle Bihar ends today. Nitish Kumar will now return as the state chief minister." He said the party hopes the Governor will call Nitish to form the government within the next 24 hours.

Responding to Tyagi, BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said, "The JD-U has insulted the Mahadalits of Bihar by forcing Manjhi to resign." He said the BJP, which had to break its 17-year-old alliance with the JD-U over Narendra Modi’s prime ministerial candidature in 2013, doesn’t know what Manjhi will do next.

The Bihar BJP had on Thursday decided to support rebel Manjhi in the crucial floor test in the Assembly and issued whip to all its 87 MLAs. The Patna High Court meanwhile barred eight rebel JD-U MLAs from voting in favour of Manjhi, who was scrambling for support ahead of the crucial Friday test.