There is still a few days left in the announcement of assembly elections in Bihar, but political parties have already started to do political equations. This time the election is going to be special for many reasons. While this election will decide the political future of CM Nitish on the one hand, on the other hand it will also clear what is the political stature of Bihar RJD.
When it comes to Nitish Kumar, let us tell you that this election is different for him from the elections so far. This is also because Nitish Kumar’s name is among the leaders who took the oath of Chief Minister most times in Indian politics. In such a situation, the result of this election will be going to decide the direction of his political journey.
Let us tell you that Nitish Kumar is one of the strong contenders for the post of CM in this time also. If we talk about his political career, then there is a very important stage in the year 2000. This was the first time he became the Chief Minister of the state for the first time. But his tenure was only seven days.
This was the period when Nitish Kumar separated from the Janata Dal and formed the Samata Party in 1994 with George Fernandes. At that time Lalu Prasad Yadav was dominated in Bihar, and Nitish Kumar disagreed with his working style and government.
Start and initial challenges of Samata Party
Samata Party contested its first major election in 1995. This election was against the Janata Dal led by Lalu Prasad Yadav. However, the party did not get any significant success in this and she could win only 7 seats, while Lalu Prasad Yadav’s government was formed again.
Subsequently, in the Bihar assembly elections of 2000, Samata Party contested the election with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The alliance together won 122 seats, including 34 seats of Samata Party and 67 seats of BJP. Janata Dal (Secular) and Janata Dal (U) candidates were also part of this alliance, who won a total of 21 seats. Later these parties merged into Janata Dal (United).
In this election, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) emerged as the largest party with 124 seats. However, the majority figure in the 324 -seat assembly was 163, which neither touched NDA nor RJD. Amidst this political deadlock, the NDA government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee at the center made a risky bet of forming a government in Bihar. At that time, Nitish Kumar, who was the leader of the Samata Party and was holding the post of Agriculture Minister at the Center, was made the Chief Minister of Bihar.
On 3 March 2000, Nitish Kumar was sworn in as Chief Minister for the first time. But his tenure was very short, because he had to prove his majority in the House. The NDA coalition also had less than 21 MLAs with majority including independent MLAs. On the other hand, Lalu Prasad Yadav’s RJD was claiming to prove a majority as the largest party. When Nitish Kumar realized that he would not be able to prove a majority in the House, he resigned from his post only seven days after taking oath on 10 March 2000.
The reason for the resignation and the events after that
The main reason for Nitish Kumar’s resignation was that he did not have enough MLAs to run the government. When he did not have a position to get a trust vote, he thought it appropriate to leave the post. After his resignation, RJD formed the government under the leadership of Rabri Devi, which lasted for the next five years.
It is interesting to know why Lalu Prasad Yadav himself did not become the Chief Minister in the 2000 elections. The reason for this was the fodder scam, in which he resigned from the post of Chief Minister in July 1997 in view of the possibility of legal disgrace and arrest. After this, he made his wife Rabri Devi the Chief Minister, who was then a housewife. She was the Chief Minister since 1997 and during the 2000 elections, the case of fodder scam was going on on her.