With the four crucial Congress members voting with the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar yesterday, the speculation is rife that this is the beginning of a formal/informal alliance between the two parties in the general elections scheduled any time next year. Yesterday, Nitish cabinet comfortably won the vote of confidence. The vote was forced by the JD-U decision to snap its 17-year-old alliance with BJP over the former’s decision to elevate Narendra Modi as its chief campaigner for the forthcoming assembly and national polls.
Nitish won 126 votes, including four of Congress and one of the CPI, in a house of 223, amid signals of a new political alignment as Congress backed the motion. The JD-U has 117 MLAs. The Congress vote was crucial as four Independents, opposed the motion.
Significantly, the Congress support for the government comes two days after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described Nitish as secular and indicated that his party could do business with JD-U. The Centre has already enhanced development assistance to Bihar as a backward state recently, setting off speculation that the two parties could come together in future elections. In his speech in the Assembly, Kumar said, without taking the name of Modi, that the main reason for breaking the alliance with BJP is the elevation of the Gujarat chief minister in his party.
Later, the chief minister thanked the Congress in general and the PM in particular for voting in favour of the trust motion.
