While narrating to his audience how Kumar had invited him to dinner and then cancelled it, Modi used this word for Nitrish and also went on to add that Kumar had not only insulted him but also a 'mahadalit' Jitan Ram Manjhi. One can appreciate the metal agony Modi had to suffer. But his attempt to bracket Manjhi along with him was beyond comprehension. This nature of actions constitutes the core of the Indian politics. Dumping L K Advani is the candid example.

Modi is known for using despicable slangs against his opponents but none expected that he would be dragging the family of Nitish. In a different situation, Nitish might have preferred to ignore the comment, but this is the election season and he would obviously like to exploit it. This nature of jibes and riles easily catch the imagination of the people. Nitish too has been using it to rouse the Bihari subnationality.

After ten days of the incident, just ahead of Modi's Gaya public meeting of August 9, Kumar raised this issue through a letter to Modi. In the letter, Nitish took strong objection to Prime Minister’s 'DNA' remark made against him, saying it was deemed as 'an insult by a large section of the people of the state and beyond' and asked him to withdraw it. In the letter released on social media sites Facebook and Twitter, Kumar said the comment of Modi was unbecoming of the office he holds. 'Your words have been taken as an insult by a large section of the people of the state and beyond. Most of us also feel that coming from you, the comment is rather unbecoming of the office you hold,' he said.

In a shrewd political move, Nitish citing the anger of the Bihari people, even suggested him to apologise to the people of the state for his remarks. He wrote, 'I have no doubt that this gesture of yours (withdrawing the DNA remark) would go a long way in assuaging the sentiments of people and would further enhance the respect people have for you'.

He also mentioned, 'Most of us feel these statements have gone beyond questioning my own descent. They have disrespected the lineage of our people and denigrated the great legacy of the state. This also gives credence to the feeling that perhaps you and your party hold a prejudice against the people of Bihar. I wonder how come the gravity of such statements repeatedly miss your alert conscience'.

It is a coincident that just a couple of days of this incident, Modi government rejected the plea for special status to Bihar. Ever since Nitish came to power in 2005 he has been harping on this issue. He has tagged the special status with the Bihari sub nationalism. By saying that the special status will change the destiny of the people, Nitish has been trying to make it a strong political agenda linking it with the Bihari pride. Naturally deprived of a strong caste based following Nitish would use this to consolidate his position.

During his ten year rule Nitish assiduously worked to arouse feeling of sub-nationalism and promoting image of Bihar worldwide, particularly among the Biharis. Undeniably, Biharis were now feeling proud of being identified with Bihar. There is a general perception that Nitish is trying to recapture the past glory of Bihar in the modern context and arousing Bihar sub-nationalism.

Significantly with the state assembly scheduled to be held in October a mad race has erupted between the BJP and JD(U) to take credit for this. The BJP leadership has been accusing Nitish of hijacking the past glories. In fact the Adhikar rally organised in 2012 was acknowledged as a departure from the past because the earlier rallies were essentially political while this was organized to raise the issue of neglect and suffering of Bihar.

Nitish's open letter to Modi ought to be seen in this backdrop. While he was trying to push the BJP leadership especially Narendra Modi on backfoot, he was also desperately trying to resurrect his old line of Bihar identity to counter the caste politics of Lalu Prasad and Narendra Modi.

Truly speaking, the BJP played the worst caste card and split the Bihari people on caste lines. Right now there are no Biharis. There are Brahmins, Rajputs, Bhumihars, Yadavs, Kushwahas, EBCs, Mahadalits, Paswans and, of course, the Muslims, even backward caste Muslims. Nitish tried to keep the “Bihari pride” factor afloat but it did not click and the party had to go back to caste.

Paradoxical as it may appear, the identity of the Bihari got currency when it was used to identify the migrants from the Hindi heartland to other States. It would not be an exaggeration to say that intellectuals misled Nitish in projecting the sub-nationality question. In fact, in Bihar there is no concept of Bihari nationalism. A Bihari was always an Indian and of so-and-so caste; whereas in Maharashtra, a person was an Indian, a Maharashtrian, his caste came thereafter. The caste remained the main social reference of individual identity. Significantly, an intermediate identity of region or sub-nationalism could never surface. An average Bihari has two identities—the first one related to caste and the second one to the nation.

Though Nitish raised the issue of self-assertion of Bihari sub-nationality it did not help the development of sub-nationalism. It was used by Nitish to consolidate his base. But this could not withstand the attack of Modi’s social engineering. In fact, the urban middle class or Westernised Bihari elites projected the issue of sub-nationalism. It is also a fact that the demand for special status for Bihar was raised by the professional, educated elites and by the Bihari entrepreneurs. They viewed the future scope through this slogan. (IPA Service)