| Kumar said today he would be holding joint campaign meetings with BJP chief LK Advani. But he refused to answer questions whether Modi would be invited to those rallies. Soon after the 2004 general elections, the JD(U) had blamed the Gujarat chief minister for the party's debacle. |
| Kumar said good governance, development and law and order would form the poll plank of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). |
| Kumar admitted that the JD(U) and the BJP had divergent views on ideological issues like reservation for Dalit Muslims and Christians. But those were subsumed under a larger goal of liberating Bihar from the misrule of Lalu Prasad's Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). |
| Both parties will have separate manifestos but a common minimum agenda. A starting point of the common agenda was already in place since Kumar had earlier written to like-minded parties for support after the last elections threw up a hung House, said Arun Jaitly, BJP general secretary in charge of Bihar. |
| "We have collated several points, written to us by different parties on what they want in a common agenda. Thus a rough draft of the common programme is ready," he said. Bihar BJP chief Sushil Kumar Modi said Kumar would be the NDA's chief ministerial candidate. |
| Meanwhile, notwithstanding the Congress assertion that United Progressive Alliance (UPA) would not project anyone as the chief ministerial candidate ahead of the polls, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad today said it was "very well understood". "It is very well understood who is the UPA's chief ministerial candidate in Bihar. Does anybody have any doubt about it," he said at a press conference, apparently referring to his wife and former Chief Minister Rabri Devi. On the UPA common minimum programme, he said it would be announced on October 4 and on its basis the elections would be fought. On the alliance's poll issues, Prasad said "definitely development and communal harmony. The track record of our government in respect of ensuring communal peace has been impeccable." |
| Attacking NDA, he said it has done "great injustice" to Bihar by not compensating state for loss of resource-rich Jharkhand. "Jis tarah humne railway ko chamkaya hai usi tarah Bihar ko chamkayenge (We will make Bihar shine the way railways are shining)," Lalu, who is railway minister, said. |
| Countering the NDA's allegations that he was misusing official machinery, Lalu said "some people are making this charge and so Dalit, Muslim and backward class officers committed to checking crime, are being transferred on such a large scale". |
| Pointing out that 20-25 per cent of poor people were yet to receive electoral photo identity cards, Lalu demanded either the Election Commission ensure that every voter gets epic or is allowed to cast vote on alternative documents. "The EC should guarantee that every voter is allowed to exercise his franchise if his name figures in the voters list." |
| Referring to LJP leader Ramvilas Paswan's charge that he was not keen on Dalit Muslims getting reservation in government jobs, the RJD chief said "we will explain our stand on the issue in our CMP. We are definitely in favour of constitution to be amended to provide reservation to them." |
| When asked for comments on kidnapped school boy Gaurav Kumar alias Golu, he said "in last polls media targeted us for abduction of Kislay. Now, the RJD is not in power, so tell me who is responsible for kidnappings? Why has the boy not been rescued?" |
| On whether the "division" in the UPA in Bihar would affect its performance in polls, he said "do not have any illusion about it. We will win". To a question on law and order situation in the state under the President's rule, Lalu said "though the state has central rule, the administration, for all practical purposes, is under the control of Election Commission". |
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