Nitish dials Naveen, seeks BJD’s support for party member
Bhubaneswar: Bihar chief minister and Janata Dal (United) president Nitish Kumar on Thursday rang up his Odisha counterpart and BJD president Naveen Patnaik to seek his support for Harivansh Narayan Singh, who has filed his nomination as the NDA nominee for the Rajya Sabha deputy chairman’s post. Nitish, during the brief phone conservation, informed Naveen about the nomination of Singh, a JD(U) member, and requested BJD’s backing. The BJD has nine members in the Upper House, official sources in the chief minister’s office said.
“The Bihar chief minister has requested our party president to extend BJD’s support to Singh for the post of Rajya Sabha deputy chairman. Our president will take an appropriate decision by considering all aspects. The election of the deputy chairman will be held on September 14. We will make our stand clear before that,” senior BJD Rajya Sabha member Amar Patnaik said.
BJD sources said the party would make its stand clear on the day of the election.
Singh is in the race for the prestigious post for a second time. In spite of not being part of the BJP-led NDA, BJD had extended support to Singh’s candidature in August 2018, when he defeated Congress’s B K Hariprasad.
The support from BJD, TRS and YSR Congress are crucial for the NDA candidate to win the Rajya Sabha deputy chairman’s post. The RJD’s Manoj Kumar Jha is likely to be the joint opposition candidate for the Rajya Sabha deputy chairman poll.
Political observers said BJD is likely to support Singh, as it has earlier thrown its weight behind the NDA in the Upper House on several key legislations. In December 2019, BJD had supported the controversial citizenship bill in Parliament. It had also backed BJP on issues like scrapping of Article 370.