Starting yatras, Nitish talks pending work, Kharge focusses on Congress work

Asked when he will start his nationwide journey for Opposition unity, Nitish said: “This leg of the yatra will conclude in February, followed by the Budget Session. I will go outside Bihar after the Assembly session.”

Far away from West Champaran, in the other end of the state, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge waved off the Bihar leg of the party’s Bharat Jodo Yatra at the historic Mandar hill area of Banka district, and criticised the BJP-led government at the Centre for its “failure to provide employment” to the youth and diverting public attention with “communally charged rhetoric”.

Kharge joined the yatra for a distance — the party’s state unit chief and Rajya Sabha member, Akhilesh Prasad Singh, will lead the yatra, which will cover 1,200 km, touching most parts of the state.

Kharge said, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi often asks us what the Congress has done in the last 70 years. Let me tell him that if he is the PM today, it is because the Congress was able to safeguard democracy and the Constitution. If people like you (Modi; could become PM) and a person like me, the son of a poor man, become Leader of Opposition and AICC president, it is only because of the Congress.”

Kharge also asked what the BJP has done for the country and said: “You neither played a role in getting the country freedom, nor fought for the country. Have you raised your hands against the British? It was the Congress that did everything.”