A sharp political broadside landed in Bihar's public square on Friday, September 25, 2026, as RJD leader and Leader of the Opposition Tejashwi Yadav posted a video on X accusing Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his cabinet ministers of making remarks that, in Tejashwi's words, 'encourage criminals and motivate them toward assault and crime.' The charge cuts directly at the heart of law and order — the issue that has long defined Bihar's political fault lines.

In the post, Tejashwi wrote: 'गुंडे-बलात्कारियों का उत्साहवर्धन कर उन्हें दुष्कर्म और अपराध के लिए प्रेरित करने वाले बिहार के मुख्यमंत्री और उनके मंत्रियों के आपराधिक विचार सुनिए' — 'Listen to the criminal thinking of Bihar's Chief Minister and his ministers, who encourage criminals and motivate them toward rape and crime.' He further accused the ruling coalition of displaying 'sympathy toward perpetrators and insensitivity toward victims' instead of addressing the root causes of crime, and asked what that reveals about their 'mentality, thinking, behaviour, conduct, and character.'

The Accusation at Its Core

Tejashwi's attack centres on a simple but politically explosive argument: that public statements by the Chief Minister and his ministers — played in the accompanying video — betray an attitudinal bias that sides with perpetrators over victims. Without verified transcripts of those statements, the specific words cannot be independently assessed. But the framing of the critique is unambiguous — Tejashwi is not just alleging a policy gap, he is alleging a moral failure at the top of Bihar's government.

The post carries an attached video, signalling that Tejashwi is presenting what he characterises as direct audio-visual evidence — a tactic designed to make the charge harder to dismiss as mere political rhetoric.

Bihar's Recurring Law-and-Order Battleground

This is not the first time law and order has become a flashpoint between the RJD and the NDA government in Bihar. Opposition parties — led by RJD — have repeatedly accused the state administration of a selective approach to criminal justice, particularly in cases involving sexual violence against women. The RJD's standard political line frames the ruling coalition as more concerned with protecting powerful perpetrators than delivering justice to victims, a narrative that resonates in a state where crime data and case pendency figures routinely draw scrutiny.

Nitish Kumar, who has been Bihar's dominant political figure for most of the past two decades, built his early brand on 'Sushasan' — good governance. Any perception that his government has grown insensitive to crime victims strikes directly at that legacy.

Why Tejashwi Is Turning Up the Volume

The combative register of this post — 'criminal thinking,' a direct demand for accountability — reflects how high the political stakes around women's safety remain in Bihar. For Tejashwi, who has spent years trying to position RJD as the voice of Bihar's marginalised communities, being seen as the loudest defender of crime victims is both a moral claim and an electoral calculation. The question he poses at the end of his post — what does this reveal about their character? — is not rhetorical. It is a direct invitation to voters to form a verdict.

The Bihar government had not issued a formal response to the post at the time of publication.