Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar announced on Saturday that a probe had been ordered into the actions of a few former ministers from the RJD, including then deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, to detect any wrongdoing in
the departments.

Nitish said that other than Tejashwi, the other former RJD ministers to be probed were Lalit Yadav and Ramanand Yadav.

“I always get everything probed. If anything wrong has occurred anywhere, then it is necessary to investigate it. We do not allow anything wrong to be done,” Nitish said.

The probe will focus on six government departments — health, urban development and housing, mines and geology, road construction and rural works. It will review the decisions taken by the three ministers. The cabinet secretariat department has already issued instructions in
this regard.

Nitish, while speaking in the legislature earlier this week, had promised a probe into the alleged wrongdoings by various RJD ministers of the previous government.

The JDU leader also slammed the INDIA bloc and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for “not paying heed” to his advice.

“I made so much effort. I was not even in favour of the name (INDIA) and had suggested another one instead. But they named the alliance whatever they had decided. Is anything happening in it now? It is going on just like that. It has virtually ended,” Nitish told reporters on the sidelines of an event to commemorate the death anniversary of former Bihar chief minister Karpoori Thakur, recently awarded the Bharat Ratna posthumously.

Nitish is widely considered the architect of the INDIA bloc while he was a part of the Mahagathbandhan government in Bihar after quitting the NDA in August 2022. He switched back to the NDA last month.

The chief minister hit out at Rahul, who was in Bihar earlier this week as part of his ongoing Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra and had attacked Nitish in his public addresses.

“Whatever he (Rahul) speaks is useless. I had suggested him so many things, but he avoided them. He is talking about a caste census. We conducted a caste-based survey here. I always used to ask him at the (INDIA) meetings to talk about the big progressive step taken by Bihar, but nobody mentioned it,” Nitish added.

The chief minister pointed out that the caste-based survey also took stock of the economic condition of the people, and the government is now trying to help the poor.

The Bihar chief minister dismissed RJD president Lalu Prasad’s comments that his door was always open for Nitish.

“Do not get into what people speak. We have come together (with the NDA) just like before and we are working for the welfare of Bihar. If I meet anyone, I greet him. It is my habit. I was going out (of the Assembly) and they (Lalu and family) were coming in. We greeted each other. This does not mean that we are coming together. We were together earlier, but things were not going well. So I left,” Nitish said.

The economic offences unit of the Bihar police has taken up the probe into allegations of JDU legislators being kidnapped before the trust vote and being offered money to switch sides. An FIR has been registered at the Kotwali police station in Patna.