Bihar and Jharkhand are one family, says Nitish Kumar

Patna, Sep 20 Following the statement of Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Bhojpuri and Magahi languages, his Bihar counterpart Nitish Kumar said that Bihar and Jharkhand are one family. If anyone tried to discriminate between these two states on the basis of language, it was his political compulsion and nothing else.

Hemant Soren on Hindi Day on September 14 said that people who speak Bhojpuri and Magahi have a dominating nature. When Jharkhand was part of Bihar, people who spoke these two languages were involved in wrongdoing with the women of today's Jharkhand. During the agitation for Jharkhand, they used abusive words in Bhojpuri. These two languages had no contribution during the Jharkhand movement. These are languages of Bihar.

"Bihar and Jharkhand are one family. A large number of people of Bihar permanently reside in Jharkhand and vice-versa. Jharkhand emerged from Bihar and our tradition and culture is more or less the same. It is unfortunate if anyone discriminates on the basis of language. A large number of people living in the border districts of West Bengal used to speak Bengali language. We cannot discriminate against them for speaking Bengali," Kumar said.

"The people of Bihar have strong family and business relations with Jharkhand," he said.

"When Jharkhand was separated from Bihar, many experts believed at that time that all natural resources went to Jharkhand. Now, what is the situation? Bihar has come a long way on the development path," Kumar said.