Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has expressed "deep anguish" over state minister Bhim Singh's remarks that soldiers were meant to "lay down their lives during service". "I am deeply anguished by the minister's remarks... I rebuked him as soon as I came to know about his remarks and asked him to tender a public apology, which he has already done," Kumar told reporters upon arrival at Jai Prakash Narayan airport in Patna from New Delhi.
Singh, the Bihar Rural Works and Panchayati Raj Minister, had created a furore earlier in the day when he said that "soldiers and policemen are recruited to lay down their lives during service".
The remarks had come in the wake of the killing of five Indian jawans, four of them hailing from Bihar, allegedly by Pakistani soldiers near the border in Jammu and Kashmir. Singh later retracted the statement and tendered an unconditional apology after being upbraided by the chief minister, who learnt of the remarks while in Delhi, where he was on a two-day visit.
When told that JD(U) ministers were conspicuous by their absence at the airport last night when the bodies of the four martyred soldiers from the state arrived, Kumar said he would "definitely" have been present there had he been in the city.
The Bihar chief secretary and senior civil service and police officials were, however, present at the airport to receive the bodies and pay floral tributes. But JD(U) ministers Renu Kushwaha, Shyam Rajak and Awadesh Singh Kushwaha had visited the slain soldiers' villages to be present for the last rites on Thursday , he said.
Kumar said his government was pained by the death of the four soldiers and had promptly announced compensation of Rs 10 each for their next of kin. "My government will consider additional compensation... for the (martyred soldiers') families, apart from whatever the Centre does for them," he said.
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