In the wake of the Bihar assembly polls, senior lawyer Ram Jethmalani on Sunday said PM Narendra Modi has cheated the people of this nation and that he should be punished for it, reported ANI.

Stating that he was against betrayers, the fomer Rajya Sabha member said that he would vote for Bihar CM Nitish Kumar if need be, as "I want to Modi to suffer defeat."

Jethmalani's fallout with Modi appears to have started earlier this year over the appointment of the Chief Vigilance Commissioner by the Central government.

In June Jethmalani, who had backed Modi as the prime ministerial candidate in the Lok Sabha elections last year, wrote a letter to the PM, calling it his "break-up" with the latter and said that his"diminishing respect" for Modi had "ended".