Patna: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Thursday justified his government annulling 34 populist decisions taken by his predecessor Jitan Ram Manjhi days before demitting office saying these were basically “non-decisions” as no laid down procedure was followed.
“The decision (to annul) was taken on the basis of legal opinion which advised so as no laid down procedures were followed,” Kumar told reporters justifying decision of his cabinet yesterday to annul approval given by Manjhi cabinet on 34 items during cabinet meeting on February 10, 18 and 19.
“The decision (to annul) was taken not on the basis of merit of the items but on the basis of non compliance of procedure,” Kumar said. “In a way these were ‘non-decisions’ as it did not follow set rules,” the Bihar CM said while justifying doing away with the 34 approvals given by Manjhi cabinet before resigning on February 20.
“There was no cabinet note for these approvals and it violated established rule of executive business,” Kumar said.
“My USP is ‘sushasan’ (good governance) and by vetting such irregular decisions I could have compromised with susha-san which is not possi-ble…even we in cabinet are not free to take any decisions without follo-wing procedures,” he said.(PTI)
