Nitish Kumar's 20 years and Bihar's growth story: A look at his legacy

After 20 years in power, Nitish Kumar leaves behind a legacy of governance reforms and social empowerment, even as questions linger over Bihar's industrial growth

If all goes according to what the Janata Dal (United) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have planned, Bihar’s incumbent — and longest-serving — Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will quit his current office on March 30 and take oath as a member of the Rajya Sabha later this week.   

Critics argue that as the CM for two decades, Nitish could have done more for the state, particularly to industrialise it. But what Nitish-led regimes have accomplished constitute remarkable feats in themselves. They pulled Bihar out of the morass of lawlessness and chronic under-development, stopped the not-infrequent instances of narsanhar (caste-based mass killing), and paved the way for a historic empowerment of women, the extremely backward castes (EBCs) and the Scheduled Castes (SCs). 

Over the course of his career, which began with participation in the ‘JP Movement’ of 1974, even Nitish’s worst detractors couldn’t accuse him of corruption and nepotism. Despite benefiting from the post-1990 backward class assertion, he was not found guilty of indulging in blatant casteism to benefit his community, the Kurmis, nor of resorting to politics of communal polarisation even when the JD(U), which he leads, aligned with the BJP. 

Nitish, who turned 75 on March 1, has been in declining health. His colleagues of several decades insist that the decision to finally bring his 50-year-old son Nishant Kumar into politics was not his, but that of the party’s senior leadership and close relatives. Until very recently, Nishant was completely away from the political spotlight. 

As the centre of power within the JD(U) shifts from Nitish to its national working president Sanjay Jha and Union Minister Rajiv Ranjan ‘Lalan’ Singh, it is crucial for it to retain the faith of women, the EBCs and Mahadalits. 

Last week, the JD(U) unanimously re-elected Nitish as its national president. Former Rajya Sabha MP Aneel Hegde, a confidante of socialist leader George Fernandes, and later Nitish’s, was the returning officer. At the JD(U)’s New Delhi office, Hegde handed the certificate of election to Jha and Lalan Singh. When journalists asked why Nitish couldn’t attend, the duo said he was busy undertaking the ‘Samriddhi Yatra’ in Bihar. In 32 public meetings, Nitish did not once mention plans of moving to the Rajya Sabha or resigning, a JD(U) leader told Business Standard. However, he did indicate at one of these meetings that BJP leader and Deputy CM Samrat Choudhary could be his successor. 

Last week, Tejashwi Yadav, the Leader of the Opposition in the Bihar Assembly, alleged that Nitish did not wish to move to the Rajya Sabha and the BJP was forcing him. Indications that Nitish’s current term could be short-lived due to ill-health were evident during the 2025 Assembly poll campaigning. On November 2, 2025, as PM Narendra Modi’s roadshow traversed across Patna, Lalan Singh stood beside him, not Nitish. A little over a year ago, while campaigning for the Lok Sabha polls, Nitish had stood beside the PM during his Patna roadshow, as he did again in Rohtas after the success of Operation Sindoor in May 2025. 

Nitish led the JD(U)-BJP alliance to a historic win in the November 2005 polls, taking charge as the CM for the first time on November 24. He had earlier served as a Union minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. “Making it easy for industries to acquire land was a focus area for us initially. But the protests that the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee-led West Bengal government faced after a historic mandate in 2006 chastened us,” a close associate of Nitish said. The Bihar government found it wise to let go of the development model that required acquiring farmlands for SEZs, the JD(U) leader added. 

But there was much to do, such as reining in rampant crime. From 2001 to 2005, Bihar reported 1,778 kidnappings for ransom, an average of nearly one incident a day. In 2005, Bihar registered 2,693 cases of kidnappings and abduction.  “During George Fernandes’ stint as Defence Minister, we had an official who would phone his wife every afternoon just to find out if their teenage son had returned safely from school. It would gall all of us, including Fernandes sahib and Nitish,” the associate said.

Within months of its formation, the state government and police used violations of the Arms Act to send over 70,000 criminals to jail. “It forced them to pursue more conventional trades. It also triggered a consumption and construction boom since people in Bihar had feared showing off wealth,” the associate said. 

Another step was women’s empowerment. Providing bicycles and allowances for girl students contributed to reducing their dropout rate from schools, and decreased Bihar’s fertility rate from 4.9 in early 2000s to 2.8 in 2023. Reservation for women in panchayats meant that of the 8,400 panchayats in the state, 4,200 are headed by women now. Increased representation of EBCs in panchayats helped end the influence of Naxalism. Encouraging women’s self-help groups by providing ₹5 lakh loans on one per cent interest was also an early initiative. In 2016, Nitish’s government implemented prohibition. His tenure was marked by the setting up of engineering colleges and industrial training institutes, building airports, and launching the ‘Har Ghar Jal’ scheme, which the Centre replicated in 2019. 

According to CPI (ML) L general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya, Nitish expanded the social justice discourse at a time when it was reduced to reservation, but he became the biggest facilitator of the BJP at a very crucial time. In the CM’s defence, the old associate recalled that after Nitish severed ties with the BJP in 2022 and formed a government with the Rashtriya Janata Dal, a college student who identified herself as an EBC, berated him at an event: “Do you want us to go back to being disempowered and taking care of cattle and our fields?” “That comment hit him hard,” the associate said, adding that Nitish probably suffered in his political career because he did not cultivate industrialists.