Bihar polls: BJP leader Chandra Mohan Rai quits all party posts

Patna, Sep 22: The dissension in Bihar BJP over selection of candidates came to fore as senior leader Chandra Mohan Rai today quit all party posts and levelled serious allegations against the party leadership on wide ranging issues, including propping up the third front.

"I have resigned from all party posts except for primary membership of the BJP which I will not quit on my own, but the party leadership is welcome to expel me as henceforth I will air my views on political issues," he told reporters here.

The 75-year-old, who held health and Public Health and Engineering Department (PHED) portfolios in the erstwhile NDA government of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar between 2005 and 2013, alleged that committed party leaders and workers have been ignored in selection of candidates for the Bihar assembly polls and rank outsiders found their way instead.

He denied assertion about being peeved with the party leadership for ignoring his son Janmejay Rai's candidature from Chanpatia Assembly seat in West Champaran district or elsewhere in his native district which was promised to him after he had publicly expressed desire to retire from active politics last year.

Rai was speaking for the party workers in general and not himself alone, the veteran leader said. Expressing his angst against the BJP leadership, Rai said, "I have been unhappy with the party since last year after it had supported dummy candidates against the JD(U) nominees in Rajya Sabha bypolls. It was wrong on the part of the BJP to destabilise the Nitish Kumar government which has a mandate to rule Bihar for five years."

"If at all the BJP wanted to take on the ruling party in the bypoll on three Rajya Sabha seats last year, it could have put up its own candidates instead of mounting on dummy candidates to defeat those of the ruling party....It was an unethical decision which I had disapproved then," the former minister said.

Rai also took the national leadership of the BJP to task for propping up the third front headed by the SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav, Jan Adhikar Party leader Pappu Yadav and AIAIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi to cut into vote bank of the grand alliance of the RJD, JD(U) and Congress to facilitate the NDA's victory in Bihar assembly polls. He described these decisions as 'immoral acts' of the saffron party.

PTI