NEW DELHI: Bihar Chief minister Nitish Kumar snapped ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party and submitted his resignation to the governor on Tuesday.
“I’ve resigned. Everyone in the party wanted to move out of the NDA. “The Governor has accepted the resignation,” Kumar said in Patna.
The BJP called this a betrayal of the 2020 mandate and the people of Bihar.
“Nitish Kumar has snapped ties with the NDA. This is a betrayal of the 2020 mandate, the BJP and the people of Bihar,” Bihar BJP president Sanjay Jaiswal said.
Nitish Kumar contested the Bihar 2020 assembly polls in an alliance with the BJP. The JD (U) had got 43 seats and the BJP had got 74 seats. The state has 243 assembly seats.
Minutes after resigning, Kumar staked a claim to form the government in Bihar with the support of the RJD, Congress, Left parties and independents.
“I have the support of 164 MLAs,” Kumar said.
Kumar accused the BJP of trying to weaken the JD (U). “BJP humiliated us. It insulted us,” Kumar said.
Kumar had previously stated that he would never again form an alliance with the RJD in his lifetime.