BJP on Tuesday slammed Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on the mid-day meal deaths issue saying he has not even bothered to visit the children who took ill or meet the family members of those kids who lost their lives. "Nitish Kumar is shamelessly trying to take cover under the conspiracy theory which certainly is very unfortunate.
The fact is that 23 toddlers have died and the Chief Minister has entered into a blame game. Nowhere in the world a school campus has been converted into a graveyard," BJP general secretary Rajiv Pratap Rudy said. He said the parents of the children who died buried them outside the school in protest against the chief minister and the JD(U) government.
While alleging that Kumar is resorting to conspiracy theories on the deaths, BJP itself raked up the caste issue. "Remarkably, 90 per cent of the children who died after consuming the mid-day meal in Gandaman village in Chhapra were from the Extremely Backward Castes (EBC).
Surprisingly, Nitish Kumar, who tom toms about the EBC in Bihar as his votebank, has refused to visit the bereaved families in Chhapra or even in the Patna hospital," Rudy said. BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain charged that Kumar is not visiting the hospital on the pretext that he is unwell and pointed out that there is a shroud of secrecy about his illness.
He said JD(U) is making political capital even in a case of grief and sorrow. "Everyday JD(U) leaders are issuing a medical bulletin that the CM is unwell. But he is holding meetings with his party leaders everyday. The CM's residence has become the JD-U headquarters," he said. Hussain said though the hospital in Patna where the kids are recuperating is just two kilometres away, Kumar has not bothered to visit nor has he called the parents of the victims.
Rudy wondered if this attitude of the chief minister is a backlash of JD(U)'s defeat in the Maharajganj Lok Sabha seat bypoll two months ago. "JD(U) wants accolades for every good thing that happens but puts the blame on others for the failures. We would like to tell the chief minister that he should not test the patience of 10.5 crore Biharis," Hussain said. BJP also maintained that JD(U) is not losing any opportunity to praise Congress, a party it opposed for several years.
"JD(U) leaders welcome any statement of any Congress leader. There is a jugalbandi going on among them to please Congress. RJD and JD(U) leaders are also competing among themselves on making statements that would make Sonia Gandhi happy," Hussain said. He also attacked Bihar Education Minister P K Sahi for saying that he cannot guarantee that an incident like the mid-meal tragedy won't be repeated.
"You have been elected by the people to ensure such a guarantee," he said. The BJP spokesperson recalled that as Railway Minister, Nitish Kumar had resigned when the train accident took place in Gaisal even though it was not his fault but today his education minister is not even ready to take responsibility.
Hussain said while BJP is playing the role of a responsible opposition, Kumar is trying to break the party with the 12 MLC posts for which the chief minister enjoys discretionary powers. BJP also said that the law-and-order situation in Bihar has deteriorated as was evident from the brutal rape of a 12-year-old girl whose eyes were gouged out by her assailants. A BJP Mahila Morcha delegation will be visiting Bihar to inquire into the issue.
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