Amid swirling rumours of discord between the two heavyweight partners in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in Bihar, Janata Dal (United) advisor and former Rajya Sabha MP KC Tyagi told The Statesman, “We will sink or swim together.”
Tyagi, who is widely regarded as the ideologue guiding JD(U) supremo Nitish Kumar on party strategy and has recently joined him on the Bihar poll campaign, asserted that the BJP and the Bihar Chief Minister are “companions in both good and bad times.”
In an exclusive interview with The Statesman, Tyagi dismissed reports of a rift between the two parties, saying, “Rumours about a section of JD(U) breaking away from the alliance and joining hands with either the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), as the party did in 2022, or the Congress, are being spread by the Congress and the RJD.”
“All JD(U) workers have been part of the socialist movement for more than 50 years. As a political party, we have stood by Nitish Kumar through thick and thin. Even when he was out of power and faced political attacks, we did not abandon him. If we didn’t leave him then, why would we leave him now,” he asserted.
“As long as Nitish Kumar is there, no JD(U) worker will separate from the party. We will sink or swim together,” Tyagi reiterated.