Patna: An FIR was registered against Union minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh ‘Lalan’ on Tuesday for making a controversial statement against opposition leaders during campaigning for arrested JD(U) candidate Anant Singh in Bihar’s Mokama, the Patna district administration said.
The minister landed in a fresh controversy with the surfacing of a video in which he purportedly asked NDA supporters to intimidate the opponents on polling day.
“The video footage was examined by the District Administration, Patna. Following the investigation, an FIR has been registered against Lalan Singh alias Rajiv Ranjan Singh under the sections of the BNSS and the Representation of the People Act,” the Patna district administration said in a post on X.
The video is of Mokama, which falls under Lalan’s Munger Lok Sabha seat, where the former JD(U) president’s defence of party candidate Anant Singh, arrested in a murder case last week, has already drawn flak from the opposition.
In the footage, Lalan could be heard saying, in Magahi, that “There are some people out here whom you must not allow to venture out on the polling day. Lock them up inside their homes. If they cajole you, accompany them to polling booths and ensure that they go home after casting their votes.”
Anant Singh, who seeks to reclaim Mokama seat, along with his two other associates -- Manikant Thakur and Ranjeet Ram -- were arrested in the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday in connection with the murder of Jan Suraaj Party supporter Dular Chand Yadav.
Yadav died while he was campaigning for Jan Suraaj Party’s candidate Piyush Priyadarshi in Mokama
area last week.
Lalan, while campaigning for Singh in Mokama on Monday, alleged that the incident, in which Yadav was killed, was a “conspiracy” and asserted that Anant Singh cooperated with the police and
followed the rule of law.