BJP Bihar chief Jaiswal meets Upendra Kushwaha

Patna, Feb 21 A day after Upendra Kushwaha announced he was quitting the Janata Dal-United and forming a new political party, BJP's Bihar President Sanjay Jaiswal met him here on Tuesday.

Jaiswal, who was in New Delhi, returned to Patna and drove straight from the airport to Kushwaha's house, where, he held a closed-door meeting, lasting half an hour with him. As per sources, he conveyed the message of BJP top leadership to Kushwaha.

Asked about the meeting, Jaiswal said that it was just a courtesy call.

"Nitish Kumar should learn about political honesty from Upendra Kushwaha . He is a MLC nominated by the Governor of Bihar, still he has announced his resignation from the post of MLC. If you are changing the alliance, you should resign from the post first and then take the mandate of the people.

"The meeting with Upendra Kushwaha has no political meaning. I just came here at a personal level to congratulate him for his brave decision," he said.

"My personal relationship with Upendra Kushwaha was not good in the past but the way he showed a brave heart and left the JD-U. It has impressed me," Jaiswal added.

Earlier, Kushwaha, praising Modi, and said that it will be very difficult for the opposition parties to remove him from power in 2024.

The BJP is currently alone in Bihar and the party think tank believes that Kushwaha may prove to be an asset for it. Though, BJP has support of Chirag Paswan and Pasupati Kumar Paras but these two are fighting with each other over the political legacy of late Ram Vilas Paswan.

Kushwaha was associated with the BJP in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, as well as in the 2020 Assembly election as well, but Nitish Kumar objected to him in the NDA and he left the alliance.

Claiming to represent Koeri caste which is a part of "Lav-Kush" equation of the JD-U, where Lav denotes the Kurmis and Kush or Kushwaha the Koeri, Kushwaha quit after Nitish Kumar announced to hand over his political legacy to Tejashwi Yadav in 2025, saying the decision would badly hit the Lav-Kush equation as they are the arch-rivals of Yadavs in Bihar.