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indianexpress.com

Newsmaker | JD(U) MP facing flak

for saying he won’t work for
Yadavs, Muslims: Who is Devesh
Chandra Thakur?
Santosh Singh
4–5 minutes

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Devesh
Chandra Thakur's remarks invited sharp criticism not only
from rival Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) but also from ally
BJP and his party’s Banka MP. (Photo: Devesh Chandra
Thakur/ X)
Devesh Chandra Thakur, otherwise known for pioneering
the idea of Bihar Diwas first celebrated in 2011, finds
himself in a controversy for the first time over his remarks
on Yadavs and Muslims. On Monday, the newly elected

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Janata Dal (United) MP from Sitamarhi said though he

would welcome Yadav and Muslim visitors from his
constituency to his home, he would not help them because
they did not vote for him.
“Yadav aur Musalman hamare yahan aate hain to unka
swagat hai. Chai pijiye, mithai khaiye. Lekin main aapka
koi kaam nahi karunga (Yadavs and Muslims who come to
me are welcome. They can have tea and sweets. But I will
not do any work for them),” Thakur said at a function in
Sitamarhi.
The 71-year-old’s remarks invited sharp criticism not only
from rival Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) but also from ally
BJP and his party’s Banka MP. While RJD leader
Mrityunjay Tiwari called his remarks “casteist and
feudalistic”, the BJP’s Other Backward Classes (OBC)
Morcha national general secretary Nikhil Anand said that
“no political party would be able to ignore Yadavs who
comprise more than 14% of the state’s population”.
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JD(U)’s Banka MP Giridhari Yadav demanded an

immediate apology from Thakur.
JD(U) chief spokesperson and MLC Neeraj Kumar told
The Indian Express, “Though a leader is well within his
rights to express his dismay at not getting support from
some sections of society, a leader of Devesh Chandra
Thakur’s stature should have refrained from making
controversial remarks in public.”
Thakur who is a resident of Sitamarhi was the first
candidate the JD(U) announced for the Lok Sabha polls.
The early announcement created a flutter in Bihar political
circles as the party denied the ticket to sitting MP Sunil
Kumar Pintu, an OBC Vaishya. Thakur, the only upper-
caste Brahmin to get a ticket from the JD(U), won by
51,356 votes from Sitamarhi, which has a sizeable Muslim
and Yadav population. While Thakur got a 47.14% vote
share, Arjun Rai of the RJD got 42.45% of the votes.

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Since 2009, Sitamarhi has elected either the JD(U) or an

NDA ally. In 2019, Pintu got 54.65% of the votes against
Rai’s 30.53%. In 2014, the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party’s
(RLSP) Ram Kumar Sharma won with 45.67% of the vote
share against the RJD’s Sitaram Yadav, who got 29.24%
of the votes.
Thakur’s comments came in the wake of a fiercely
contested election, which was pitched as a battle between
RJD’s Muslim-Yadav vote bank and the rest. Even after
the barrage of criticism from all corners, Thakur remained
unapologetic. “I have been in politics for 25 years now. I
have worked for all. I said what I felt. I did not get support
from these two communities. I have nothing against them
but cannot do their personal work,” Thakur told reporters
on Monday.
Thakur’s father Awadh Thakur was a renowned lawyer

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and trying to follow in his footsteps he too got his LLB

degree from the Indian Law Society in Pune. After
spending time in the Congress from 1990 to 1996, he quit
politics to work for a shipping company. He returned to
politics in 2002 when he became an Independent MLC.
In 2008, Thakur joined the JD(U) and was renominated as
an MLC. He later became Bihar’s disaster management
minister. Thakur who had been demanding Bihar Diwas be
celebrated since 2000 finally impressed upon Chief
Minister Nitish Kumar to approve it through the Cabinet in
2010. Thakur organised Bihar Diwas events in Mumbai in
2012 to popularise it among Biharis living outside the
state.
Thakur was again nominated as an Independent MLC in
2014 and was named a JD(U) MLC for his fourth term in
2020. He became the Bihar Legislative Council
chairperson in August 2022. Nitish is known to hold
Thakur in high regard, once publicly describing him as
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someone who “knows as much about Ganga’s gahrai

(depth) as about Nepal’s terai (foothills)”.

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