UP CM Adityanath congratulates Nitish Kumar for taking oath as Bihar CM

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday congratulated Nitish Kumar for taking oath as the Chief Minister of Bihar.

In a post on 'X', Adityanath said, "Hearty congratulations to Shri @NitishKumar ji on taking oath as as the Chief Minister of Bihar and Shri Samrat Chaudhary ji and Shri Vijay Sinha ji on taking oath as Deputy Chief Ministers! Fully confident that the double engine government formed in Bihar will set excellent standards of service, good governance and development in the state under the guidance of respected Prime Minister Shri @narendramodi ji."

JD(U) president Kumar on Sunday took oath as Chief Minister of Bihar for the record ninth time after a dramatic volte-face, ditching the Mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance) and the opposition bloc INDIA and forming a new government with the BJP, which he had dumped less than 18 months ago.

Kumar was sworn in by Governor Rajendra Arlekar at the Raj Bhavan in Patna in the presence of senior leaders, including BJP national president J P Nadda, hours after he resigned from the post, saying "things were not working well" for him in the Grand Alliance and the opposition bloc.

BJP leaders -- Samrat Choudhary and former speaker Vijay Kumar Sinha -- were among those who took oath of office. The two are named as deputy chief ministers.

Earlier, Choudhary and Sinha were named as leader and deputy leader, respectively, of the BJP legislature party. They thanked the party's top leadership for the opportunity and vowed to "protect Bihar from the jungle raj unleashed by Lalu Prasad's RJD".

JD(U) members Vijay Kumar Choudhary, Vijendra Yadav and Shrawan Kumar also took oath apart from former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi-led Hindustan Awam Morcha's Santosh Kumar Suman and independent legislator Sumit Singh.