Amit Shah told us to fan out with Modi govt’s work, says Bihar BJP chief

PATNA: Union home minister Amit Shah, who was on a quick visit to Bihar, told state party leaders on Sunday to focus on the Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra and apprise people in every corner of the state about the welfare initiatives taken by the government led by PM Narendra Modi, Bihar Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Samrat Choudhary said on Monday.

Choudhary said Amit Shah met BJP leaders at the circuit house before leaving Patna on Sunday evening and gave them a to-do list.

“All BJP leaders have to fan out. Each Rajya Sabha MP has to cover three Lok Sabha constituencies, while each Lok Sabha MP has to cover two, including the one they represent. Every MLA has to cover two assembly segments. They have to stay in a constituency for three days. This is also a stock-taking exercise since the Modi government wants all welfare schemes to benefit all without discrimination,” he added.

The Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra is a nationwide campaign that aims to raise awareness, especially among rural populations, about government schemes. During his speech on Saturday, Modi said the drive had reached 1.25 crore (12.5 million) people in over 40,000 gram panchayats.

Choudhary said the home minister wanted the party to reach out to every household with the ‘Modi ki guarantee’ initiative comprising welfare schemes and tell the people how the quest for a developed India by 2047 would mean positive change in their lives. “He said that the people have already seen the JD-U and the RJD and BJP needed to build on Narendra Modi’s achievements and trust among the people,” he added.

Choudhary said Nitish Kumar had lost people’s trust and was largely perceived as” weak, sick and indecisive”. “He has lost the perception battle and was losing his image in the new company of the RJD. BJP knows he is a spent force,” he added.

“BJP always favoured caste survey and increase in quota. They cannot take credit alone. Besides, BJP has greater credibility among the backward classes due to three consecutive state presidents from them - one from Yadav, another from Vaishya and the third from a Kushwaha. People have seen this and they know what the BJP is all about. Here there is no family to encourage and protect,” he added.

Shah reiterated at the eastern zonal council meeting in Patna that the Centre never created any hurdles in holding Bihar’s caste-based survey and that the BJP backed it when it was part of the government in Bihar, but “it had issues and they needed to be resolved”.

At a rally in Muzaffarpur last month, Amit Shah alleged that the population of Yadavs and Muslims was inflated and the numbers of extremely backward classes (EBC) reduced in the Bihar caste survey as part of the Nitish Kumar government’s “appeasement politics.

The JD-U, promptly, hit back. Party spokesman Neeraj Kumar said that census was the constitutional responsibility of the Centre and the Bihar government stepped up only after the Centre did not do it. If Shah has issues with the Bihar caste-based survey, the Centre should conduct a nationwide caste-based economic survey and refrain from rhetorical statements, he added.