BJP’s Bihar ally faces revolt as 7 leaders quit, hit out at chief Upendra Kushwaha: ‘Desperate to promote family’

“I have been with Kushwaha ji for the last nine years and understand his politics very well. The man who once fancied himself as (Chief Minister) Nitish Kumar’s successor had been unsure about the future of his party (then the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party) after he drew a blank in the 2020 Assembly polls. Since he sees no future for himself, he seems desperate to promote his family. However, his non-legislator son becoming a minister is blatant favouritism,” Jitendra Nath, who was the RLM’s official number two before he resigned, told The Indian Express. Nath was eyeing a ticket from Shekhpura, which eventually went to the JD(U).

Apart from Nath, RLM state vice-president Mahendra Kushwaha, state general secretary and spokesperson Rahul Kumar, state general secretary and Nalanda in-charge Rajesh Ranjan Singh, state general secretary and Jamui in-charge Bipin Kumar Chourasia, state general secretary and Lakhisarai in-charge Pramod Yadav, and Shekhpura district president Pappu Mandal have also resigned.

The RLM won four of the six seats it contested as part of the NDA in the Bihar Assembly polls. The party got one ministerial berth in its quota after the NDA swept the polls, winning 202 of the state’s 243 seats.

Referring to the RLM chief as a “fallen pillar of socialist politics”, Mahendra Kushwaha said Upendra Kushwaha had forgotten the core socialist ideology. “He spoke of moral values and ethics but did not follow them himself.”

Rahul Kumar described his resignation as a “one-sided affair” that had come to an end and said the RLM chief had “fallen into the trap of dynastic politics”. “Now, there is no difference between him and other leaders who have only promoted their family. A simple worker like me has no place in the RLM,” he said.

While Rajesh Ranjan said he quit because he did not subscribe to the ideology of a party that “does not value its workers and gives it all to family”, Mandal questioned Upendra Kushwaha’s move to dissolve the Sheikhpura unit without taking workers into confidence.

In a lengthy post on X on November 21, Kushwaha addressed the criticism sparked by his son’s appointment as the state Panchayati Raj minister. “If you have placed our decision in the category of nepotism, then please understand my compulsion a little. This step was not just necessary but inevitable to save and sustain the party’s existence and future … you all know that in the past, we had to take an unpopular decision to merge the party that faced sharp criticism across Bihar. Even then, after great struggle, with your blessings, the party produced MPs, MLAs, everything. People won and then left. The coffers remained empty. We reached zero. It was necessary to think so that such a situation doesn’t arise again,” he wrote.

In the past, Kushwaha has targeted the RJD and its founder, Lalu Prasad, over “dynasty politics”. During the Bihar bypolls in November 2024, he said the RJD “runs entirely in the name of inheritance, not merit”.