Nitish Government Wins Confidence Vote

PATNA:
The Nitish Kumar government today won the crucial confidence vote in the Bihar Assembly with the ruling coalition of the JD(U), BJP and others getting 131 votes while the opposition got 108 votes.
The trust vote was taken through lobby division. The NDA had earlier submitted a list of 132 MLAs to the governor. These include 71 of JD(U), BJP 53, RLSP two, LJP two, HAM one and three Independents.
In the 243-member Bihar Assembly, the RJD has 80 MLAs, the Congress 27 and the CPI-ML has three.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who resigned on Wednesday and later joined hands with the BJP to reclaim the government was sworn in as Chief Minister on Thursday.
The reason for Nitish Kumar to quit was his falling out with Deputy Chief Minister Teshaswi Yadav, the son of RJD supremo Lalu Prasad. Yadav is facing corruption charges but had refused to step down despite Kumar’s exhortations.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi praised him for his honesty in standing up to corruption. Then the BJP said it would support him, and its legislators met Kumar’s JD(U) MLAs. After the meeting, Kumar, accompanied by senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi drove to Raj Bhavan to stake claim to form the government.
The JD(U)-BJP combine returned to power after four years in the politically volatile state. Prodded by Kumar, the JD(U) had walked out of the NDA in July 2013 after Narendra Modi was nominated head of the BJP’s campaign committee for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.