by Alok Mohit
PATNA: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said those who claimed themselves to be disciples of Jayaprakash Narayan had sacrificed his socialist ideology and joined hands with the Congress.
In a veiled attack on the ruling Grand Alliance (Mahagathbandhan) leaders of Bihar, Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad, Shah said they were taking names of Jayaprakash Narayan, popularly known as JP, but sitting in the lap of the Congress party.
Shah was addressing a rally after unveiling a 15-feet high statue of JP on his 120th birth anniversary at Sitab Diara, the birthplace of the Socialist icon, in Bihar’s Saran district, situated on the borders with Uttar Pradesh.
In an apparent dig at Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, who dumped the BJP to form a new seven-party coalition government in August, Shah said some people today were changing sides for power.
“He is power hungry, and for power, he sacrificed JP’s ideologies and joined hands with the Congress. He has nothing to do with the ideologies of JP, who had not done anything in his life for power,” Shah said without taking the name of Kumar.
The Union home minister said Prime Minister Narendra Modi was a firm believer in JP’s ideology. “The Prime Minister is working for the poor and the weaker sections of the society, for whom JP was concerned. This is the reason the Centre had launched welfare schemes like ‘Antyodaya Anna Yojana’ and Ujjwala Yojana,” he added.
UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath, who was also present on the occasion, said his government had done a lot for the development of those areas of Sitab Diara which fell in the jurisdiction of Uttar Pradesh.
