A high political drama was played out in Bihar on Monday when 13 RJD MlAs walked out of the party, but within minutes, six of them returned ‘home’ alleging that the their signatures were forged. However, the lot of seven MlAs stood by their decision to form an independent bloc inside the Assembly and lend support to the Nitish Kumar Government.
The JD(U) badly needed the RJD MlAs’ support to boost its number in the Assembly and stabilise its Government and give it a psychological edge in the run up to the Assembly polls. In the 242-member Assembly, JD(U) has 116 MlAs and is backed by four Congress MlAs. With the new development, Nitish seems to be preparing the ground for a possible scenario in which the Congress might withdraw support to the Government.
The RJD had 22 MlAs before the split. leader of the rebel group and MlA Samrat Chaudhury told the media that 13 MlA had written to the Assembly Speaker for a separate sitting arrangement in the House and had declared to support the Nitish Government. Chaudhury even mentioned the names the MlAs: Raghvendra Pratap Singh, lalit Yadav, Chandrashekhar Singh, Durga Prasad, Zaved Ansari, Ram lakhan Ram Raman, Abdul Gafoor, Dr Faiyaj Ahmed, Jitendra Rai, Aniruddh Kumar, Akhtarul Imam and Javed Iqbla Ansari.
“Yes, we’ve quit the RJD as the party of late had become the B-team of the Congress party. Our leader lalu Prasad has been sitting in the lap of the Congress party…it was better to merge the party in Congress,” Chaudhury said. lalu, who was in Delhi, came to know of the development from TV channels and wasted no time taking the damage-control exercise. He called some of these MlAs and was able to persuade six of them to return “home”.
Within minutes, these six MlAs, led by their ClP chief Abdul Bari Siddiqui, were at the RJD office in Patna and denounced the bid to break the RJD through “fraud.” “It’s a fraud and mischief done by the ruling party and its leader Nitish Kumar to harm the RJD. The current Government leadership has conspired to survive the Government which is in minority,” charged the MlAs in one voice.
When asked how their signatures appeared in the list, the MlAs emphatically said mischief by RJD leader Samrat Chaudhury. “We’ll check and verify how and from where our signatures came up in that list… On two occasions our signatures were taken on a piece of paper by Samrat Chaudhury but that was not meant for this exercise,” they protested. Earlier, while talking to the media, Samrat Chaudhury had said that he along with others would support the ruling party and its leader Nitish Kumar for fighting against “communal forces”. Party sources told The Pioneer that Chaudhury wanted to contest the upcoming lok Sabha poll from Khagaria constituency but lalu Prasad was not ready to give him a ticket.
Two days back, Samarat Chaudhury had accompanied Nitish Kumar in his helicopter to Khagaria to attend a Government function and his visit had triggered speculation of a possible defection in the RJD. The prevailing rumour is that Nitish has promised to give all the dissident RJD MlAs a berth each in his Government. There are currently 16 ministers at present and Nitish could include 19 more.
later, BJP leader Shahnawaj Hussain and Giriraj Singh accused Nitish of engineering the defection in the RJD to survive his minority Government. “Nitish Kumar is quite expert in defecting parties to survive his Government. Earlier, he had engineered defection in the lJP when three of its total four MlAs had joined JD(U),” charged state BJP leader Giriraj Singh.
Interestingly, lalu Prasad refused to make any comment. “let me check the facts,” he quipped before huddling himself with top party leaders for an emergency damage-control exercise. The six RJD MlAs present with Abdul Bari Siddiqui were Akhtarul Islam Sahi, lalit Kumar Yadav, Chandrashekhar, Abdul Gafoor, Dr Faiyaz Ahmed and Durga Prasad Singh.