Busy with Narendra Modi's Sankalp Rally in Patna, Bihar ministers skip receiving body of CRPF jawan killed in Kupwara

The absence of any senior leader or minister from the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government was conspicuous on Sunday when the body of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) inspector Pintu Kumar Singh arrived at Patna airport. The jawan was killed in an encounter with militants in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kupwara district on Friday .

It is believed that all representative of the Bihar government were busy with the ‘Sankalp Rally’ in the state capital, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bihar chief minister addressed a large gathering. It was at this rally at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan that Modi kick-started the NDA government’s poll campaign in the state for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

District magistrate Kumar Ravi, senior police officer Garima Mallick, CRPF officers, state Congress chief Madan Mohan Jha and Lok Janshakti Party MP Choudhary Mahboob Ali Kaiser were present at the airport to receive the jawan’s body.

Pintu was from Dhanchakki village in Bihar’s Begusarai district. “It’s very unfortunate that Chief Minister Nitish Kumar did not bother to come to pay his last respects,” Sanjay Singh, uncle of the CRPF inspector, was quoted as saying by NDTV.

The Congress leader said: “I am not here for politics. I came to pay my respect.”

The encounter in Kupwara’s Handwara area  ended on Sunday after a 56-hour gunfight in Babagund village of Langate. Two policemen, three CRPF jawans and a civilian, besides two militants, were killed in the encounter.

With inputs from agencies