Former governor of Bihar Ram Nath Kovind has been announced as the NDA candidate for the presidential elections due on 17 July. The results of the elections will be declared on 20 July and the new President will assume office from 24 July. The opposition parties have announced he name of Meira Kumar as their contender against Ram Nath Kovinnd.
While all political parties are deciding on which candidate to support, the decision has been the most difficult for Bihar Chief Minister, Nitish Kumar. The JD(U) led by Nitish Kumar has extended it support to the BJP-led NDAs candidate. Though there are a series of events which led to this decision.
According to the sources, Kumar had earlier in a meeting of the opposition parties, suggested the name of Gopal Krishna Gandhi, DMK leader M K Stalin had also supported this suggestion. Gopal Krishna was also one of the choice of CPM as well as Trinamool Congress. However, Congress did not pay any heed regarding this. Kumar also alleged Congress for delaying in announcing the name of opposition candidate for the Prez Polls. He said that Congress waited for BJP to first announce its candidate.
This actually triggered Kumar’s decision to support the NDA Candidate. When asked, why JD(U) was supporting the NDA Candidate, he said that Ram Nath Kovind has been a non-controversial Governor of Bihar and that the JD(U) was supporting Koivnd for his behavior and conduct as the governor.