‘Ask Nitish on corruption in Bihar’: Union minister jabs Oppn over June 23 meet

Union minister Anurag Thakur on Monday hit out at the opposition parties over the scheduled June 23 meeting in Patna.

“Those opposition parties that are going to Bihar must ask Nitish Kumar about the corruption that is going on there…this shouldn’t be an alliance of corrupted parties. They should also say who is the leader of their alliance…”, the minister told reporters in Mumbai.

Continuing his attack on Nitish Kumar, the minister said,”The opposition leaders going to Bihar must ask Nitish Kumar about the ₹1,750 crore bridge which has collapsed like a pack of cards several times. They should also ask him about the ambulance scam worth several crores of rupees and scams carried out by builders”.

Earlier, the opposition leaders were scheduled to meet on June 12 in Patna. The huddle was deferred because Rahul Gandhi, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and DMK chief MK Stalin were unable to attend the huddle due to their pre-scheduled engagements.

The opposition meeting will be now held on June 23 in Patna to form a combined front against Narendra Modi-led NDA in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Besides Rahul Gandhi, Kharge and Stalin, the other big opposition leaders attending the meeting include Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee, former Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray, Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav.

Last week, the Bihar chief minister at an event had hinted at a possibility of early Lok Sabha elections. Nitish Kumar had said he was told during rural development department meeting that all projects would be completed by January 2024. The CM urged the officials to complete all projects as soon as possible, saying nobody knows when the general elections would be held. It could be held before time, this year itself, Nitish had added.