Patna,(BiharTimes): A day after addressing district office-bearers of the Janata Dal (United) at his residence in Patna, in which chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi was not invited, former chief minister Nitish Kumar on Friday, while speaking at a function organized to mark the 120th birth anniversary of former President V V Giri said that he is not running away from the responsibility, meaning thereby that he is still in the race for the post of chief minister. Not only that he held the administration responsible for the stampede at the southern gate of Gandhi Madian on Ravan Dahan evening and called the Bhojpur gang-rape incident shameful. 
Political observers are surprised over this latest twist in the ruling party’s politics. Janata Dal (United) insiders are asking as to how can a former chief minister invite the meeting of district office-bearers of his party, yet keep the chief minister away? Has Manjhi nothing to do with the state politics? Or is it that Nitish wanted to convey some message to the party office-bearers and does not want it to share it with Manjhi?
Anyway analysts are of the view that if Nitish is not panicky, he is at least alarmed over the way Manjhi is trying to assert both politically and administratively. The transfer of officials and action against doctors, said to be closed to Nitish, by the present chief minister after the Oct 3 tragedy, came as a big surprise as hardly anyone expected the latter to go tough. “If Nitish Kumar could not take any action against anyone after the Chhath incident or serial blasts in Patna and Bodh Gaya and Kosi flood, nobody ever expected Manjhi to do so,” a Bihar watcher commented.
It is quite clear that Nitish Kumar would return to be the chief ministerial candidate of the party for the 2015 Assembly election. Then why he on Friday said that he is not running away from the responsibility. Does he want to remind Manjhi that after all he is the mentor? This is the feeling doing the rounds in the political circle.
It is being observed that Nitish perhaps underestimated Manjhi, who had won the first Assembly election before the former. He was the minister even during the Congress years in 1980s. He is a seasoned player and knows that Dalit leaders are at a premium. Though Bihar has 15.1 per cent Dalit population, Mahadalits alone comprise 11-12 per cent. Manjhi is trying to cultivate this votebank and the temple purification episode is being seen in this light. Manjhi was left alone within his party on this issue. This isolation may help him say look how the influential castes treat the Dalits.
“The manner in which Nitish ignored the chief minister of his own party and did not invite him at the JD(U)’s office-bearers meeting suggests that he is deliberately humiliating the man, whom he had handpicked for this post after the May Lok Sabha debacle,” said an observer.