“ Jab Baat Bihar Ki ho, Naam Sirf Nitish Kumar Ka Ho ” (When it is about Bihar, Nitish Kumar should be the only name)—the Janata Dal (United) slogan during Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s Pragati Yatra that started from Champaran on December 23, sought to build an impression that Kumar is the face of National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and is in command like he was in the many previous elections. On the posters was a picture of the relatively younger-looking, bespectacled Nitish Kumar gesturing assertively with his index finger. Team Nitish’s assertion comes amid conflicting statements from the BJP, the NDA’s lead partner in Bihar, over the alliance’s leadership for the 2025 Assembly election.
Kumar has been the face of the NDA in the State since the October 2005 Assembly election and was made Chief Minister even when the BJP won more Assembly seats than the JD(U), like in 2020. Also Read | Nitish Kumar saves the day for NDA in Bihar In 2015 when Kumar fought the State election in alliance with Lalu Prasad’s RJD, he got the Chief Minister’s chair even though the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) bagged more seats than the JD(U) did. Kumar, first called ‘Mr Clean’ for his non-corrupt image and later nicknamed “Paltu Ram” for his frequent political somersaults, has shifted alliances multiple times.
He broke his 17-year-old alliance with the BJP in 2013 to join hands with the RJD and Congress in 2015, only to return to the BJP in 2017. In 2022, he parted ways wit.