Bihar CM Nitish Kumar calls Asaduddin Owaisi a BJP agent

PATNA: Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday slammed AIMIM national president Asaduddin Owaisi, calling him an ‘agent’ of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Hitting back at the AIMIM chief for blaming the Nitish-led Mahagathbandhan government for “not controlling” the recent communal disturbances at Bihar Sharif and Sasaram towns, the CM said, “He (Owaisi) is the “agent” of who is ruling at the Centre”.
Responding to media queries on the sidelines of a government function organised on the birth anniversary of former deputy prime minister and famous Dalit leader Babu Jagjivan Ram, Nitish said, “Two people were behind the communal disturbances in Bihar. One is in the (Union) government, and the second one is his agent”.
Asked for his reaction to Owaisi’s claim that both the BJP and the JD(U) benefitted from communal riots in Bihar, Nitish quipped, “Who is he? What is AIMIM? Which place does he belong to? What stakes does he have in Bihar?” The JD(U) leader also said that Owaisi is the “agent” of who is in the government at the Centre.
Nitish also wondered about the magnitude of publicity Owaisi gets in the national media.
“Have you seen how much publicity he (Owaisi) gets in the national media? The political parties which have a large number of MPs hardly get publicity. But he gets too much publicity across the country. This shows he is an agent.”
The CM also revealed that Owaisi wanted to meet him when the JD(U) leader walked out of the NDA in August last year to form a government with the RJD, but he (Nitish) flatly refused. “He had expressed a desire to meet me when I left the NDA. I refused,” Nitish said.
It is for the first time that Nitish openly spoke against Owaisi.
Earlier on Tuesday, Owaisi had attacked the Nitish government for failing to control communal riots in Bihar Sharif and Sasaram during the Ram Navami festivities.
"Whenever there is violence in a state, the responsibility for it falls on the concerned state government. Madrasa Azizia in Biharsharif was set ablaze, and shops of Muslim minorities were targeted. … CM Nitish and Deputy CM Tejaswi Yadav were already aware that Nalanda is a sensitive district yet there was a disturbance there. He (CM Nitish Kumar) has no remorse, he even attended an Iftar on Monday," Owaisi said in a press conference at Hyderabad on Tuesday.