BHOPAL, 29 March 2005 — Janata Dal-United (JD-U) leader Nitish Kumar yesterday said his party would start fresh efforts to end a month-long deadlock on government formation in Bihar.

A day ahead of JD-U leaders’ meeting today to chalk out a fresh strategy to form the state government, Nitish Kumar said his party was working on a new formula to end the deadlock over forming a non-Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) government in Bihar.

“The JD-U will come out with a new formula to form a non-RJD government in the state,” he told reporters in New Delhi.

He said the JD-U would try to bring all non-RJD parties on one platform to form a government. “All non-RJD parties will have to come on one platform and make their stand flexible to form the government.”

However, referring to his party’s tie-up with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Nitish Kumar said no non-RJD government could be formed without the BJP’s support.

Hinting that JD-U’s relations with the BJP would continue, he said BJP could give outside support to the government.

The Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) of central Steel Minister Ram Vilas Paswan is ready to support the JD-U to form a government if it snapped ties with the BJP.

The JD-U contested the assembly polls along with the BJP, with the latter securing 37 seats and the former 55. LJP has 29 seats in the 243-member house.

The JD-U’s three-day conference in Rajgir, a historic Buddhist center in Nalanda district, will start today — a month after the state threw up a fractured verdict in the assembly polls, leading to president’s rule from March 7.

Meanwhile, Sharad Yadav, the JD-U president and Rajya Sabha member, has said that the NDA has prepared new strategy to form the government in Bihar before the president’s rule gets a second term. 

“In Bihar the electorate’s mandate was for a anti-Lalu government and NDA has formulated a new plan to fulfill aspirations of the people of Bihar,” said Yadav who boasted to have introduced Lalu to politics. He said that he has warned Paswan that he should be more reasonable. “People will punish those who will create hurdles in formation of a new government in Bihar,” said Yadav.

Yadav who had come to Bhopal after completing a tour of Jabalpur and Katni districts was talking to scribes before leaving for Delhi on Sunday. He claimed that the NDA has prepared a comprehensive strategy but he refused to reveal further.