Father-Son Politics: Lalu Pushes Tejashwi, Nishant Backs Nitish for Bihar CM Race
Patna: A son is promoting his father and a father is promoting his son for the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections. At Islampur in Nalanda district, home town of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, RJD president Lalu Prasad Yadav appealed to the electorate to help promote his son Tejashwi as the next chief minister.
Lalu even released the agenda of governance of the projected chief minister, saying Tejashwi will give free electricity and a monthly pension of Rs 2,500 to all women. Lalu exhorted the voters not to be cowed down by anyone and ensure his 35-year-old son is sworn in as the chief minister.
Under Tejashwi's leadership, RJD had won 77 seats in the 2020 assembly elections. Tejashwi started his political career as the deputy chief minister under Nitish Kumar twice.
On the other hand, Nishant, the 49-year-old engineering son of Nitish Kumar, made an appeal to the people of Bihar to re-elect his father as the chief minister. While Nishant, a former student of BIT, Mesra, is out of politics, unlike the 9th pass-out Tejashwi who became the deputy CM in the infancy stage of his political career.
Nishant, who avoids media attention, was talking to media persons at a family function at Bakhtiarpur, his parents' home, claimed his father has developed Bihar since February 2005, when Nitish became chief minister for the first time. Nishant has all praise for his chief minister father and said since he was still deep into developing the state, he deserved to be re-elected as CM again.
Bihar has a history of previous chief ministers promoting their sons in politics. K B Sahay's son could become an MLC, Jagannath Mishra's son is a minister, Karppori Thakur's son is a union minister, Lalu's children are ministers and MPs. Daroga Prasad Rai's sons also became ministers, Kedar Pandey's son was an MP, and Jitan Ram Manjhi's son is a minister.
However, there are former chief ministers like Mahamaya Prasad Sinha ,Bhola Paswan Shastri, Satish Prasad, and BP Mandal who could not promote their children in the cabinet. Sardar Harihar Singh, who was chief minister in the 70s, had aptly commented on the role of sons during a political crisis: "There is no problem, some of the legislators conspiring against me are friends of my sons and some are sons of my friends."
