Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi today accused Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of "lying blatantly" about the episode of cancellation of dinner for BJP leaders here in 2010.
Kumar had yesterday sought to steer clear of the controversy and had passed the buck to Sushil Modi.
"I did not cancel the dinner in the name of Narendra Modi...I got trapped in the 'chakkar' (influence) of Sushil Kumar Modi," Kumar had said at a function here about the cancelled dinner which had created misgivings within BJP.
Coming down heavily on the chief minister, Sushil Modi said in a statement, "Nitish Kumar is speaking a blatant lie that I had asked him to cancel the dinner. Rather I tried to convince him that he should not humiliate leaders with whom he had worked as union minister. Such behaviour is not part of DNA of a citizen of Bihar."
"Kumar had made a hue and cry over an ordinary incident of publication of a photograph of him with Narendra Modi (then Gujarat chief minister) and cancelled the dinner for BJP leaders. Today he has no reservation in getting clicked with Lalu Prasad who pushed Bihar towards jungle raj...Publication of photograph was not an excuse," the statement said.
Kumar, he claimed, has a "long history" of humiliating George Fernandes, Shivanand Tiwari and more recently Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav.
"Humiliating politicians out of arrogance has become part of Kumar's political DNA," Sushil Modi added.
