Can't a Dalit fly? Bihar IAS officer's charter flight for family sparks row

A chartered flight from Delhi to Patna taken by a Bihar-cadre IAS officer and his family has triggered a political storm over privilege and propriety. After a Congress MLA raised questions over who paid for the trip, a BJP minister invoked the officer's Dalit identity to defend him. He turned the row into a slugfest charged with caste.

A senior Bihar-cadre IAS officer is at the centre of a political controversy. The Opposition in Bihar questioned how a civil servant flew his family on a chartered flight. However, a debate that should have centred around accountability and use of public money sank into the swamp of caste politics.

The Opposition—the RJD and the Congress—questioned how the IAS officer, Nilesh Ramchandra Deore, could afford a chartered flight and who paid for it. Deore took the chartered flight with his family from Delhi to Patna last year.

The JDU-BJP-led Bihar government said that the plane was already returning to Patna, and he only made the best use of it.

However, the controversy took a turn when Bihar minister Ashok Choudhary used Deore's Dalit identity to hit back at the Opposition. He wielded the convenient weapon of caste, and asked whether the officer had no right to fly because he was a Dalit.

Here's all that has happened so far.

The controversy began in the Bihar Legislative Assembly on Monday. RJD MLA Rahul Sharma flagged that Nilesh Ramchandra Deore had travelled by a chartered plane with his family from New Delhi to Patna in June 2025, reported Bihar Tak, India Today Digital's sister portal.