This refers to the editorial, “Alliance of compulsion” (August 13). The editorial has hit the nail on the head by dubbing the lalu-Nitish tie-up in Bihar as a partnership of immediate need, given the fact that both the Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Janata Dal (United) faced a drubbing in the recent parliamentary election.
Both Mr Nitish Kumar and lalu Prasad find in this occasion of rapprochement after as many as 23 years, the last hope for their political survival. They will want to extend the alliance for the ensuing Assembly poll in the State, depending on the outcome of the partnership in the August 21 by-election.
But on the face of it, the much-hyped coming together of the two arch political rivals after more than two decades was a damp squib; media reports that only a few hundred people showed up to witness this much-flaunted event, where the two politicians hugged each other, guided by the electoral compulsion to fight a resurgent BJP.