Nitish Kumar in Delhi, meets Rahul Gandhi, attends PM Modi’s dinner

Janata Dal United chief Nitish Kumar on Saturday attended Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s special dinner in honour of outgoing President Pranab Mukherjee. The Bihar chief minister utilised his trip to Delhi to full as he also managed to meet Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi and his party’s patriarch Sharad Yadav to discuss growing rift in Grand Alliance back home. 

He also met President-elect Ram Nath Kovind at the dinner. JDU had supported Kovind's candidacy, risking a rift with its traditional non-BJP allies. 

According to sources, Nitish met with Sharad Yadav for an hour while his meeting with Rahul lasted 35 minutes.

Kumar drove to Gandhi’s Tughlaq Lane residence and discussed graft charges against Bihar Deputy Chief Minister and RJD chief Lalu Prasdad’s son, Tejashwi Yadav.

Kumar is in the national capital to attend a dinner hosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in honour of outgoing President Pranab Mukherjee.

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His meeting with Rahul Gandhi comes at a time when there are differences over the continuation of Tejashwi in the state cabinet, thus posing a “threat” to the grand alliance between the JD(U), RJD and Congress in Bihar.

While the RJD supremo has rejected demands of resignation of his son, Kumar is learnt to have reservations about Tejashwi’s continuance as it dents his “anti-corruption” image.

Kumar-led JD(U) had also crossed swords with the opposition over its support to NDA’s presidential nominee Ram Nath Kovind. The opposition had pitched for Meira Kumar as its joint candidate for the presidential polls.