Emotional Nitish refuses JD(U)’s request to stay

PATNA: The JD(U) legislature party on Sunday decided to take the final call on choosing a new leader tomorrow in the wake of the resignation of chief minister Nitish Kumar.
JD(U) MLAs unanimously chose Nitish Kumar as their leader and insisted that he withdraw his resignation, but an emotional Kumar refused.
When MLAs persisted asking him to continue as CM and even threatened to sit on dharna at his residence, Kumar sought time till Monday to convey his decision, party spokesman Sanjay Singh told reporters.
Accordingly, JD(U) legislature party meeting has been called again on Monday, Singh said.
Nitish Kumar in his speech at the meeting said his continuing as chief minister would be a loss for the party and insisted on not withdrawing his resignation.
Kumar said he would devote more time to the party remaining out of power. He also said that rival BJP was making mockery of his resignation by describing it as “nautanki” (drama). But, party legilators refused to buy his argument.
Earlier, senior minister Narendra Singh proposed the name of Kumar as party leader in the assembly and all MLAs supported it, JD(U) MLA Ashok Kumar said. Name of no other leader as new leader was proposed in the meeting, he said. JD(U) president Sharad Yadav, reported to be not in favour of continuation of Kumar after severe drubbing in Lok Sabha polls, was present in the meeting which witnessed sloganeering in favour of Kumar.
Earlier during the day, Yadav faced stormy protest from Kumar’s supporters for his stand outside the chief minister’s house.
Raising the slogan of “One leader One mission”, the legislators highlighted that since they got peoples’ mandate in 2010 assembly poll in the name of Kumar he should continue during the remaining 18 months of the present assembly.
Of the total 117 party MLAs, four women legislators, who have been suspended for anti-party activities in the parliamentary poll, were not invited at the 90-minute-long meeting at the residence of the chief minister.
An Independent Binay Bihari, however, attended the meeting. (PTI)