Patna: In a huge setback to chief minister Nitish Kumar, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rejected his long-pending demand for granting special category status to be granted to Bihar.

The rejection of his demand comes barely 50 days after Kumar walked out of the erstwhile ruling Grand Alliance and formed a government with the BJP in Bihar.

The development came to light only two days back when Rao Inderjit Singh, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Planning, shot off a letter to a Pappu Yadav, a Bihar parliamentarian, who had asked the government to clarify its position on the special status. Yadav represents the Madhepura seat in the Lok Sabha.

“An inter-ministerial group formed on September 8, 2011 had earlier discussed the issue of granting special category status to Bihar. It presented its report on March 30, 2012. On the basis of the present criteria fixed by the NDC [National Development Council], the group had come to the conclusion that Bihar can’t be granted Special Category status... There is no change in this criteria till date,” Rao said in his letter to Yadav.

The letter was sent on September 13.

The minister in his letter also cited how the government has fixed five points in its criteria for granting special category to states. They include:

(I) Hilly and difficult terrain;

(II) Low population density or sizeable share of tribal population;

(III) Strategic location along borders with neighbouring countries;

(IV) Economic and infrastructural backwardness; and

(V) Non-viable nature of state finances.

Yadav attacked the Modi government for rejecting this demand, saying the granting of this status could have fast-tracked development works and spurred growth in Bihar.

“This is [mismatched] alliance in Bihar and has nothing to do with the welfare of the state,” Yadav said.

Granting special category status to Bihar has been a key issue for the Bihar chief minister. How this holds significance for Kumar is underlined from the fact that he held a massive rally at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan in November 2012, which was followed by another rally in Delhi in March 2013.

Even Modi, when he was the BJP candidate for top office in the 2014 Lok Sabha election campaign in Bihar, had promised to grant special category status to the state, in addition to a special financial package if his government came to power.