Patna, Nov 3 (IANS) Bhagirath Manjhi, the son of Bihar’s mountain man Dashrath Manjhi, disclosed on Monday that it is the Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who acknowledged, admired and gave recognition to his father’s momentous work of carving a road through a mountain and said that he will remain eternally grateful to him for this gesture.

He also recalled his meeting with the Leader of the Opposition, Rahul Gandhi, who built a pucca house for his family, but expressed disappointment over being denied a Congress ticket despite getting assurances from him.

Bhagirath Manjhi, in a special interaction with IANS, said, “The person who highlighted my father Dashrath Manjhi’s work was Nitish Kumar. It’s because of him that my father’s accomplishments came into the spotlight.”

When asked about Rahul Gandhi’s outreach, he said, “I met Rahul Gandhi for the first time, some time ago. I wasn’t acquainted with him before.”

Notably, the son of the ‘mountain man’ was courted by the Congress party ahead of elections and was also promised a poll ticket to contest the Bihar polls, a claim Bhagirath Manjhi continues to make and expressed disappointment after being denied the opportunity.

“I told Rahul Gandhi that if I don’t get a ticket, you will receive strong criticism. I told him that I will also face rebuke for siding with the Congress,” said Manjhi with his voice showing disenchantment with the grand old party.

He, however, said that he was grateful to Rahul for building a pucca house for his family and also informed that he was not informed about this in advance, either by the Congress MP or anyone else.

“After about a week of meeting Rahul, engineers arrived in my village and prepared a house for my family, which has four bedrooms, one bathroom and a kitchen each,” he said.

Recalling the meeting, he said that Rahul closely interacted with him, sat on his cot and also drank coconut water.

Notably, Dashrath Manjhi, his father and popularly known as Bihar’s ‘mountain man’, got his name etched in the history books and became an inspiration for the next generations.

Dashrath Manjhi, a resident of Gehlaur village, near Gaya, had carved a path 110 m long (360 ft), 9.1 m (30 ft) wide and 7.7 m (25 ft) deep through a ridge of hills using only a hammer and chisel, as per government records.

He did it single-handedly using hammer and chisel, and because of his hard labour, the travel distance between the Atri and Wazirganj blocks of Gaya town was reduced from 55 km to just 15 km.

–IANS

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