After joining hands and hugging each other publicly at Hajipur, RJD chief lalu Prasad and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar on Sunday shared dais for second time at Chapra while attacking the BJP and reiterating that their alliance would herald the beginning of the end of the resurgent saffron forces from the State and the country.
Earlier, after nearly two decades of political rivalry, both the leaders had made their first public appearance at an unimpressive rally in Hajipur on August 11.Both the RJD and the JD(U) have forged an alliance with the Congress to contest the upcoming bypolls on 10 seats in the State scheduled to be held on August 21. With four seats for each, they have left two seats of Narkatiaganj and Bhagalpur for the Congress.
However, unlike the Hajipur rally both lalu and Nitish maintained distance and sat separately at the Chapra rally. Except the last minute photo-op they even shied away from making any on stage conversation.At the Chapra joint rally, which witnessed better turnout than unimpressive Hajipur rally, both the leaders jointly campaigned for RJD candidate Randhir Singh.
The visibly pleased lalu once again emphatically said, “Nitish Kumar hamare chhote bhai hain … hum inhe god mein baithaye ya kandhe par ... god mein baithe hain to kya phenk deIJ (Nitish Kumar is my younger brother and if he sits in my lap should I throw him outIJ). Earlier too lalu had been reiterating the same while explaining his alliance with Nitish.lalu expressed excitement over joining hands to counter the BJP in the State. Though, the same verve apparently was missing from Nitish whose focus was on attacking the BJP.
While attacking the BJP, lalu said it was a party which spread communal hatred and fraction in society. “Gandhi topi chhod kar ab kesaria pagdi bandh kar lal Kile se bol rahe hain log (now instead of Gandhi cap people are have started wearing saffron bandana),” said lalu while taking dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day attire.
“If you add up the votes we, me and Nitish, had got together in the last lok Sabha polls, you would find that we got more votes than the BJP. It is clear that the BJP was not voted in Bihar and since now we’ve joined hands together we’d give them a crushing defeat,” declared lalu.Similarly, former Chief Minister Nitish too said that he forged an alliance with lalu and the Congress to counter the resurgent BJP in the State.“BJP is a party which spreads venom in society and to check this party’s resurgence I’ve made an alliance with the RJD and the Congress,” explained Nitish.
He further urged the party workers to work hard till the election day because “those who have allied against are members of a rumor spreading party”.“Yeh bhagawan ko doodh pilane wali party hai ... aise party se aap logon ko sawadhan rehna hai (this is a party which offers milk to God ... you all have to be alert with the growth of such party),” said Nitish.
Interestingly, both the leaders essentially reiterated what they had earlier said at Hajipur rally. later, they appealed for vote to RJD candidate Randhir Singh, son of former RJD MP and an influential leader of the constituency Prabhunath Singh and flew off to Mohania to address another joint rally.The BJP has fielded party leader Kanhaiya Singh against Randhir Singh from Chapra Assembly constituency which fell vacant after BJP leader Janardna Singh Sigriwal was elected to the lok Sabha.
For the BJP, the bypoll contest in Chapra appears to be tough as a rebel BJP leader with strong RSS background Dr CN Gupta too has thrown his hat in the ring. The bypoll will be held on 10 seats at Hajipur, Chapra, Mohiuddinagar, Narkatiyaganj, Mohania, Jale, Bhagalpur, Banka, Rajnagar and Parbatta. Earlier six of the seats were held by the BJP while RJD had three and one was in the kitty of JD(U).