Nitish Kumar will be taught lesson: Narendra Modi

PATNA: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi today launched a 'virtual' election campaign in Bihar making a veiled attack against his bete noire Nitish Kumar saying those who 'betrayed' BJP will be defeated by people of the state.

"There is a 1974-like anti-Congress wave prevailing in the country now. The mandate of the people of Bihar was for NDA. Like then (in 1974), those who betrayed the people's mandate in Bihar will be taught a lesson," Modi told party leaders without taking the name of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

The Bihar Chief Minister, who has been opposed to Modi's style of politics, dumped BJP after his elevation as election campaign chief in his party last month.

Modi talked to leaders of BJP in Bihar over their mobile telephone through audio bridge technology. A total of 1,500 leaders across the state were chosen and they were divided into three groups. He talked to five leaders of each group.

Among those Modi talked to were former Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Modi, former Ashwani Chaube, who was stranded in Uttarakhand for some time, state BJP Vice President Sanjay Mayuk, MLAs Nitin Narain and Vijay Singh.

Bihar BJP President Mangal Pande told Modi that everyone was talking about the possibility of his becoming Prime Minister.

The chief minister laughed away the suggestion and said price rise was now emerging as a major issue and BJP workers should work hard to fight the Congress-led Central government on this and other issues.

When he talked to party leaders in Arrah, Aurangabad and Baata, Modi appeared to show some geographical knowledge of the areas when he mentioned some of the places. To one of them, he talked about the late JD(U) leader Digvijay Singh.