File photo of Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi
Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi today attacked senior BJP leader and former deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi over his remarks on the medical scam in the state and said he was indulging in it to derive political mileage by implicating senior leaders of his own party in it.
"Modi is deliberately speaking about medical scam. He knows that other senior leaders of his party like Nand Kihsore Yadav, Chandra Mohan Rai, Ashwini Choubey and others, who could pose a challenge to him, will be implicated in it. He thinks this will make his political career obstacle-free and it will shine brightly," Mr Manjhi said.
The Chief Minister was talking to mediapersons on the sidelines of a seminar organised by a civil society organisation on 'Role of public private partnership mode in education and development in Bihar'.
"(Sushil) Modi thinks if he keeps speaking on the issue (medical scam) then the involvement of his rivals within the party will come to light. The internal politics of BJP is behind whatever Modi is saying," Mr Manjhi added.
He also used the opportunity to once again defend senior JD(U) leader and former chief minister Nitish Kumar, whom Mr Modi is relentlessly targeting in the Rs 25 crore financial irregularities detected by Accountant General (Audit) so far in the purchase of medicines, medical equipment and infrastructure.
The senior BJP leader has been alleging that the scam happened when Mr Kumar was also holding the charge of the health portfolio.
"There is no question of Nitish Kumar being involved in the scam. There is no hand of him in all this because the scam is not of the period when he was in charge of the Health Department," added Mr Manjhi.
Speaking at the seminar, Mr Manjhi said Bihar government is trying to expand education to each and every village and is giving special attention to education of girls.
He added that apart from providing free books, dresses, scholarships and mid-day meals, the government has also distributed 14 lakh bicycles among the students.
"We are spending over 24 per cent of our Rs 1.16 lakh crore annual budget on improving and expanding education in the state. Bihar is the first state in the country where so much money is being spent on education. Over 4 lakh teachers were appointed during the tenure of Nitish Kumar as the CM," said Mr Manjhi.
The Bihar Chief Minister also promised one plus two (higher secondary) school in each of the 8,400 panchayats in the state by 2017, and that the government is working on upgrading several middle schools to high schools.
He also informed that at present Bihar has 75,000 government primary schools, 25,000 middle schools, and around 10,000 plus two schools, whose number will go up to 18,000 by 2017.
Mr Manjhi expressed his favour for the mixed economy system in which public and private sector work together for the welfare of the people.
"The poor children in Bihar lack resources for education. Still, we are trying hard. The state's population has reached 11 crore; the literacy rate has also grown to 65 per cent. We are providing various facilities, including scholarships to students belonging to SC, ST and MBC categories," Mr Manjhi said.
The Chief Minister, however, expressed concern that teachers in the state are not trying to provide all-round education to students and build their character.
"Teachers were much respected in the society and the present ones should change their behaviour accordingly to clinch back their lost prestige. The teachers in private sector schools get Rs 10,000 a month, yet government teachers, getting Rs 40,000 per month, keep agitating," he added.
Mr Manjhi also called for government teachers to compete with private school teachers in the standard of education.