Patna : Bihar Assembly's Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav on Wednesday slammed the state government over the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the poll bound state. He claimed that the state is being "remote controlled" from Delhi, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah giving "orders" carry out the voter roll revision.
"The way state is being run from Delhi on remote control, with either Prime Minister Amit Shah, they are the ones giving the orders. The SIR too is being done on their orders by the Election Commission. Before, it used to happen that voters choose the government, now it is flipped, government is choosing their voters," the Bihar LoP said during a press conference after the assembly session.
He also repeated the claim of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar being unfit for running the government, alleging that the CM had no idea of what was happening in the Assembly.
"We also met with the Speaker, and we requested as the CM had gotten up when I was speaking on what he wanted. Everyone in the assembly knows what the discuss is about but CM does not know, he says whatever he wants. CM is not in a state to run the government anymore," Yadav said.
Earlier today, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader also addressed the assembly, during which Yadav said multiple ministers and the Deputy CM were also reprimanded by the assembly Speaker Nand Kishore Yadav. He accused the state ministers of doing "halki rajneeti" (light politics) by interrupting his speech.
"It was very painful to see that the people in government, sitting in big positions, like ministers of Deputy CM, doing such light politics does not suit them. Speaker had also said that he will give everyone a chance to speak, so it is common sense that ruling party will also get a chance to speak, but some people do 'halki rajneeti,' they lower the dignity of the house. If you would see then the Speaker reprimanded the Deputy CM and ministers as well," the Bihar LoP added.
Training his guns at Deputy CM Vijay Sinha too, he added, "We were speaking with permission, but the comment comes from Deputy CM Vijay Sinha, who does not know anything but likes to talks nonsense. He only knows how to be highlighted, how to be in front of camera, only this."
"If the Opposition leader will not speak in the Assembly then who will speak? If Opposition will not ask question, who else will?" the RJD leader asked.
He also rubbished claim of foreign nationals from Bangladesh, Nepal, Myanmar and other places being present in Bihar's voter list. Yadav said that if such people really are in the list, then the blame squarely lies on the ruling alliance of Janata Dal (United), who has been in power since 2005 and with the BJP who has been in Centre since 2014.
"These people made a statement that someone is a Bangladeshi, a fake voter is from Nepal, he is from Myanmar. When we showed the evidence and said that the affidavit given to the Supreme Court by the Election Commission of more than seven hundred pages, in that the EC has not mentioned any foreign nationals as voters. When no mention is there, then how can such a statement be made by such an important person. BJP also has several thousand BLAs, no one has ever before raised issue of fake votes," he said.
"If this exists too, then who has been in power since 2005? Who has been PM for last 11 years? This means that your government only would have given the documents. So when they themselves do not have answers, they just create chaos in House and stopped it," he added.
Earlier today, while addressing the Bihar Assembly, Tejaswhi Yadav criticised the requirement of 11 documents for voter registration, questioning how the poor would manage to produce such paperwork.
"I asked for only four things. The voter list was first published in February, and after the Lok Sabha elections, a revision could have been done. Instead, they are rushing everything now. They are demanding 11 documents, which poor people do not have. Where will poor people get so many documents in just 25 days?" Tejashwi highlighted the challenges faced by economically disadvantaged citizens, underscoring the issues they encounter. The Election Commission requires new voters to submit 11 documents, including identity proof, birth certificates, residence certificates, Aadhaar cards, and mobile numbers.