New Delhi:
Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, who skipped a luncheon meet of opposition parties on Friday, met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday at the lunch hosted for visiting Mauritius Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth.
There has been speculation about a tie-up between JD(U) and the BJP, something Kumar has repeatedly refuted.
JD(U) had broken its 17-year alliance with BJP in 2013 after Narendra Modi was declared the saffron party's prime ministerial candidate.
#WATCH: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar meets Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi pic.twitter.com/KS5MJBIJBI
— ANI (@ANI_news) May 27, 2017
Such conjecture has grown following the Supreme Court's decision to try RJD chief Lalu Prasad in four fodder scam cases and fresh allegations of corruption against him and his family members.
Read | Will consult opposition before picking presidential candidate: Amit Shah
Kumar heads the JD(U)-RJD-Congress coalition government in Bihar. The chief minister has maintained a silence on the allegations against the RJD supremo and his kin, merely saying it was for the central government to look into them.
Bihar CM Nitish Kumar addresses the media after meeting PM Modi https://t.co/Vm8bzdXSYb
— ANI (@ANI_news) May 27, 2017
Nitish, however downplayed speculation about his skipping the luncheon meeting hosted by Sonia Gandhi and accepting an invite of the Prime Minister to join a lunch, terming it as 'misinterpretation'.
The Prime Minister's lunch is in honour of Mauritius Prime Minister. "It's all nothing but misinterpretation," Kumar told reporters asking them not to read too much into it.
Kumar said, "There is nothing about going or not going. I had told Ahmed Patel about this 4-5 days back itself when he had called me to invite JD(U) for the meeting over lunch". "The invitation was given to JD(U) and Sharad Yadav attended it as party representative," he said emerging from a meeting of the state cabinet.
(With inputs from PTI)
