Nitish Kumar counters PM Narendra Modi on Bihar package: Centre doing no favour

In a federal structure, a state gets its share in central taxes and the Centre has no option but to give it,” Nitish told reporters, referring to Modi’s remarks at a rally in Bhagalpur.

He added that Modi made such “shallow” comments as he was “disturbed” by the fall in the GDP rate and Sensex under his rule. Nitish also slammed the PM for using a “manufactured” data of health sector to show that the state has not done well.

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“I am surprised at the data that Bihar has only 70 community health centres. I do not know where he got his data from. Maybe from Gujarat, which is good at manufacturing. Seems data is also being manufactured these days. The number of primary health centres has increased from 298 to 533 and each of them caters to about 11,000 patients. We upgraded 120 hospitals as community health centres,” he said.

Reacting to Modi’s jibes of Nitish “being in Delhi” when earthquake hit the state, Nitish said: “Does one know when a quake will occur? I returned to Patna by the next flight. I do not have to learn disaster management lessons from anyone, nor do I need a certificate from anyone for my development credentials”.

Claiming that recent figures reflect a downslide in Indian economy and a sharp dip in growth of the agriculture sector in the past one year, the Bihar CM said the PM should present his record card every year rather than giving it before the next Lok Sabha election.

Responding to Modi’s claim that Nitish’s Rs 2.7 lakh crore vision was merely the sum of Bihar’s annual budget of Rs 50,000 crore to Rs 55,000 crore over the next five years, Nitish said the state’s budget was about Rs 1.2 lakh crore this year and the state is expected to generate more funds in the coming years.