Nitish Kumar

For the Canadian cricketer, see Nitish Kumar (cricketer).

Nitish Kumar
29th, 31th & 32th Chief Minister of Bihar
Incumbent
Assumed office 24 November 2005
Deputy	Sushil Kumar Modi
Preceded by	President's rule
In office 3 March 2000 – 10 March 2000
Preceded by	Rabri Devi
Succeeded by	Rabri Devi
Minister of Railways
In office 20 March 2001 – 21 May 2004
Preceded by	Mamata Banerjee
Succeeded by	Lalu Prasad Yadav
In office 19 March 1998 – 5 August 1999
Preceded by	Ram Vilas Paswan
Succeeded by	Ram Naik
Minister of Agriculture
In office 27 May 2000 – 21 July 2001
In office 22 November 1999 – 3 March 2000
Minister of Surface Transport
In office 13 October 1999 – 22 November 1999
In office 14 April 1998 – 5 August 1999
Personal details
Born	(1951-05-01) 1 May 1951 Bakhtiyarpur, Patna, Bihar
Nationality	Indian
Political party	Janata Dal (United)
Spouse(s)	Late Smt. Manju Kumari Sinha
Children	Nishant Kumar (son)
Residence	1 Anne Marg, Patna
Alma mater	National Institute of Technology, Patna
Profession	Politician Social Worker Agriculturist Engineer
Religion	Hinduism
Website	http://cm.bih.nic.in
As of 18 June, 2006 Source: Government of India

Nitish Kumār (born 1 March 1951) is an Indian politician who has been the Chief Minister of Bihar since 2005; previously he was a Union Minister of India. He belongs to the Janata Dal (United) party. As Chief Minister, he gained popularity by initiating a series of developmental and constructive activities including building of long-delayed bridges, re-laying roads that had ceased to exist, appointing over 100,000 school teachers, ensuring that doctors worked in primary health centers, and keeping crime in check.

Early life and career

Nitish Kumār was born in Bakhtiyarpur, Patna , Bihar to Kaviraj Ram Lakhan Singh and Parmeshwari Devi. His father was a freedom fighter and was close to the great Gandhian Bihar Vibhuti Anugrah Narayan Sinha, one of the founders of modern Bihar. His father, who was also an Ayurvedic Vaidyaraj, left the Indian National Congress to join the Janata Party, after it denied him candidature in the 1952 and 1957 general elections.

He has a degree in electrical engineering from the Bihar College of Engineering, Patna now NIT Patna. He joined the Bihar State Electricity Board, but almost halfheartedly, and later moved into politics.

Political career

Nitish Kumar belongs to a socialist class of politicians.He learnt the lessons of politics under the tutelage of stalwarts Jayaprakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia, Karpoori Thakur, George Fernandes, S N Sinha and V. P. Singh.

Early career

Nitish Kumar participated in Jayaprakash Narayan's movement between 1974 and 1977, and was close to Satyendra Narayan Sinha, a prominent leader of the time. In the 1980 Bihar assembly elections, Kumar stood from Harnaut, which had a strong presence of his fellow Kurmis. He lost, however, to a Kurmi ‘bahubali’ (muscleman/criminal politician). He was first elected to the Bihar Legislative Assembly in 1985 as an independent candidate. In 1987, he became the President of the Yuva Lok Dal. In 1989, he became the Secretary-General of the Janata Dal in Bihar. He was also elected to the 9th Lok Sabha the same year. Nitish was aligned with Laloo Prasad Yadav for years before they parted ways and Samata Party came into existence in 1994.

Union Minister in Centre

In 1989, Nitish Kumar was appointed as the Union Minister of State for Agriculture in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh. In 1991, he was re-elected to the Lok Sabha and became General Secretary of the Janata Dal at the national level and the Deputy Leader of Janata Dal in the Parliament. He represented Barh parliamentary constituency in the Lok Sabha between 1989 and 2004.

He briefly served as the Union Cabinet Minister for Railways and Minister for Surface Transport and then as the Minister for Agriculture in 1998–99. In August 1999, he resigned following the Gaisal train disaster. During his term as Minister of Railways, he brought widespread reforms such as internet ticket booking facility, opening a record number of railway ticket booking counters and introducing revolutionary tatkal scheme for instant booking.

The infamous Godhara riots of 2002 started during his tenure as railway minister when a muslim mob burnt alive some hindu passengers in a train.

Later that year, he rejoined the Union Cabinet as Minister for Agriculture. From 2001 to May 2004, he served as the Union Cabinet Minister for Railways in the NDA Government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. In the 2004 Lok Sabha elections he contested elections from two constituencies, Barh and Nalanda. He was elected from Nalanda but lost from his traditional constituency, Barh. He was the leader of the Janata Dal (United) Parliamentary Party in the Lok Sabha.

Chief Minister of Bihar

1st Term (3 March 2000 – 10 March 2000)

On 3 March 2000, Nitish Kumar was appointed the Chief Minister of Bihar, but he resigned seven days later because failed to prove majority. RJD leader Lalu Prasad Yadav enjoyed the majority.^{[citation needed]}

2nd Term (24 November 2005 – 24 November 2010)

In November 2005, he led the National Democratic Alliance to victory in the 2005 Bihar assembly elections bringing an end to the 15-year rule of the Lalu Prasad Yadav-led Rashtriya Janata Dal. He was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Bihar on 24 November 2005. Under his government, Bihar developed an electronic version of the Right to Information Act called Jankari scheme. In addition, he launched the E-shakti NREGS program, by which rural people can get employment information by telephone. He is credited with improving infrastructure, and reducing crime, widely felt to be serious problems in the state.

Under his governance Bihar has had a record number of criminal prosecutions through fast track courts. His government initiated a mandatory weekly meeting with all District Magistrates to monitor progress at the grassroot level. His government has generated employment in police services and teaching. Bihar recorded record construction work during his five year mandate, surpassing the national average.

Nitish Kumar government also initiated bicycle and meal programs – the government gave bicycles to girls who stayed in school – which saw Bihar getting huge number of girls into schools and fall in school drop out rates. Women and extremely backward castes were given 50% reservation in electorals for the first time ever in India. However, bicycle scheme of Nitish Government has been criticised by some people because of corruption involved in the scheme.^{[citation needed]}

Health schemes were launched to improve village hospitals and the free medicine distribution system. Loan schemes for farmers were improved by involving national banks.

The state witnessed steep hike in GSDP growth, the second highest in the country. Bihar was recorded as the highest tax payer state in eastern India.

Dr. Abdul Kalam, former President of India and Nitish Kumar initiated the Nalanda International University project, headed by the Prime Minister of India.

3rd Term (26 November 2010 to present)

In 2010, Nitish Kumar's party swept back to power along with its ally Bharatiya Janata Party. On 26 November 2010, Nitish Kumar took oath as a Chief Minister of Bihar. This is his second consecutive term as Chief Minister of Bihar.[2] In a keenly fought contest, Nitish Kumar led JDU-BJP combine won with four-fifth majority. NDA won 206 seats while RJD won 22 seats. No party there has won enough seats to represent the opposition in the state assembly, which requires at least 25 seats to become eligible to represent the main opposition party. For the first time electorates witnessed high turnout of women and young voters, while this was declared as the fairest Bihari election, with no bloodshed or poll violence.

Personal life

On 22 February 1973, Nitish Kumar married Manju Kumari Sinha, a teacher by profession. They have a son, Nishant, who is a graduate of BIT, Mesra. His wife died in 2007 at the age of 53. His nickname is 'Munna'. He is a teetotaler, does not smoke, and is a frugal eater.

Awards and recognition

• JP Memorial Award, Nagpur's Manav Mandir, 2013
• Ranked 77th in prestigious Foreign Policy Magazine top 100 global thinkers 2012.
• XLRI, Jamshedpur "Sir Jehangir Gandhi Medal" for Industrial & Social Peace 2011.
• "MSN Indian of the year 2010"
• NDTV Indian of the Year – Politics, 2010
• Forbes "India's Person of the Year", 2010
• CNN-IBN "Indian of the Year Award" – Politics, 2010
• NDTV Indian of the year – Politics, 2009
• Economics Times "Business reformer of the Year 2009".
• 'Polio Eradication Championship Award' 2009, by Rotary Internationals.
• CNN-IBN Great Indian of the Year – Politics, 2008
• The Best Chief Minister, according to the CNN-IBN and Hindustan Times State of the Nation Poll 2007.

Positions Held

Period	Positions	Note
1977	Contested first assembly elections on a Janata Party ticket.
1985–89	Member, Bihar Legislative Assembly.	First term in Legislative Assembly
1986–87	Member, Committee on Petitions, Bihar Legislative Assembly.
1987–88	President, Yuva Lok Dal, Bihar.
1987–89	Member, Committee on Public Undertakings, Bihar Legislative Assembly.
1989	Secretary-General, Janata Dal, Bihar.
1989	Elected to 9th Lok Sabha.	First term in Lok Sabha
1989-16 July 1990	Member, House Committee.	Resigned
4/1990-11/1990	Union Minister of State, Agriculture and Co-operation.
1991	Re-elected to 10th Lok Sabha.	2nd term in Lok Sabha
1991–93	General-Secretary, Janata Dal. Deputy Leader of Janata Dal in Parliament.
17/12/91-10/5/96	Member, Railway Convention Committee.
8/4/93-10/5/96	Chairman, Committee on Agriculture.
1996	Re-elected to 11th Lok Sabha. Member, Committee on Estimates. Member, General Purposes Committee. Member, Joint Committee on the Constitution (Eighty-first Amendment Bill, 1996).	3rd term in Lok Sabha
1996–98	Member, Committee on Defence.
1998	Re-elected to 12th Lok Sabha.	4th term in Lok Sabha
19/3/98-5/8/99	Union Cabinet Minister, Railways.
14/4/98-5/8/99	Union Cabinet Minister, Surface Transport (additional charge).
1999	Re-elected to 13th Lok Sabha.	5th term in Lok Sabha
13/10/99-22 November 1999	Union Cabinet Minister, Surface Transport.
22/11/99-3 March 2000	Union Cabinet Minister, Agriculture.
3/3/00-10/3/00	Chief Minister, Bihar.	as 29th Chief Minister of Bihar, only for 7 days
27/5/00-20 March 2001	Union Cabinet Minister, Agriculture.
20/3/01-21 July 2001	Union Cabinet Minister, Agriculture with additional charge of Railways.
22/7/01-21 May 2004	Union Cabinet Minister, Railways
2004	Re-elected to 14th Lok Sabha. Member, Committee on Coal & Steel. Member, General Purposes Committee. Member, Committee of Privileges. Leader Janata Dal (U) Parliamentary Party, Lok Sabha.	6th term in Lok Sabha
From 24 November 2005 – 24 November 2010	Chief Minister, Bihar.	as 31st Chief Minister of Bihar,
From 26 November 2010 – Till Date	Chief Minister, Bihar.	as 32nd Chief Minister of Bihar

See also

• List of Chief Ministers of Bihar

External links

• Biography on Bihar Government website
• Biography on website of Lok Sabha