Nitish Kumar denies rumors of an alliance with the BJP

Nitish Kumar, the chief minister of Bihar, said on Monday that he would sooner die than ally with the BJP.

He criticized the renaming habits of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led administration at the Center and emphasized that the BJP will not win any seats in Bihar in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

In Hindi, "Sawal hi nahi paida hota hai. Unke saath jaana humko kabhi kabool nahi hai, mar jana kabool hai. There is no doubt about following them: Ye achchi tarah samajh lijiye. I would much rather die than accompany them (BJP). Understand this very well," Nitish said to the press as he presented flowers to honor Mahatma Gandhi on Martyrs' Day.

His declaration followed the BJP Bihar in-charge Vinod Tawde's allegation that the party's national president J.P. Nadda and Union home minister Amit Shah had declared that there wouldn't be any coalition with Nitish or his Janata Dal United at their state executive in Darbhanga on Sunday (JDU).

Sushil Kumar Modi, a Rajya Sabha member and former deputy chief minister of Bihar, was among the top BJP officials who reaffirmed the party's decision not to work together with Nitish once again because of his declining popularity and diminished capacity to sway voters.

Further responding to the remarks made by BJP leaders, Nitish stated: "They are all speaking nonsense because they are so concerned that they won't receive anything here. Just wait and see the general election outcomes in 2024... They just make up stories about winning 36. (out of 40 Lok Sabha seats). Nothing will be available to them in the state.

The chief minister's declaration put an end to rumors that he might do another somersault, at least in the near future. He had firmly said in 2015 and 2016 that he would sooner die than work with the BJP and the RSS, only to join up with them in 2017.

Similar declarations about never siding with Nitish have also been made at that time, between 2015 and 2017, by the BJP.

The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) may have been prompted by the BJP's most recent assertions that it does not support Nitish or the JDU to increase pressure on him to resign as chief minister and transfer power to deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.

Speaking with media outside of the state event, Nitish stated that his administration was trying to spread Gandhi's ideas and was also utilizing modern communication technologies to do so. He said that doing so would promote social change and promote unity among the populace.

"Attempts by some to convince people to forget about Bapu won't work. These days, those at the top (read: the Center) indulge in a variety of activities. Can we overlook the freedom movement's past? You are giving objects new names! These things are difficult to forget. Everything will stay the same, said Nitish.

"Atal Bihari Vajpayee was among us. He was excellent. So we departed. The BJP then repeatedly urged us to meet in 2017 after that. We realized our error after following them. In the 2020 Assembly election, what did they do? Because the BJP won more seats, I did not want to become the chief minister, but I was compelled to do so. But I saw that the BJP leaders began engaging in undesirable activities rather than cooperating amicably as they had in the past," Nitish said.

The chief minister emphasized that the BJP has evolved into a new party after the entry of the new members, and is no more the party of Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani.