Jolt for Nitish, Lalu as Samajwadi Party pulls out of Janata Parivar

Several days ahead of crucial Bihar assembly polls, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad faced a twin setback as the Samajwadi Party (SP) pulled out of the grand alliance and RJD veteran Raghunath Jha resigned from the party on Thursday.

The development is a major blow to the so-called six-party Janata Parivar — led by SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav — which came together after the general elections to ward off a surging BJP that had romped home in a clutch of state elections after a stunning Lok Sabha victory. The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) had earlier opted out of the alliance.

In a damage control move, Janata Dal (United) president Sharad Yadav, however, has ‘claimed’ that he will discuss the issue with SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and resolve the matter amicably. 

“Mulayam Singh is an old friend of mine and has good ‘understanding’ of politics. We will sit together and discuss all the issues and I’m very much ‘sure’ that he will be back in Janata Parivar family,” Yadav said.

“I just got to know through the media that the Samajwadi Party is not happy with the seat sharing. In a grand alliance such things happen. We will not allow him to walk out of the alliance. Their concerns will be addressed soon,” he added.

The ruling party of Uttar Pradesh was cut up over the five seats allotted to it as part of an Opposition coalition taking on the BJP in the October-November state polls and that too from Lalu Yadav’s RJD’s quota of share of seats.

“Top leaders, grass root level workers and more importantly, the Bihar unit, were mighty angry with the treatment doled out to us. We will soon announce the number of seats the SP will contest and the candidates,” said SP national general secretary Ramgopal Yadav, after a crucial meeting of the party’s parliamentary board in Lucknow.

Ramgopal Yadav, who had strongly opposed the merger of parties in the name of <g data-gr-id="49">grand</g> alliance, questioned the sanctity of <g data-gr-id="39">parivar</g>. “What <g data-gr-id="40">parivar</g>? There was no <g data-gr-id="41">parivar</g>... It never existed. I always knew that it can’t take off and I categorically said formalising it is signing the SP’s death warrant. It would have meant losing the party’s <g data-gr-id="42">hard earned</g> identity,” Ramgopal said.

 In another major jolt to Lalu Prasad, a key constituent of the Janata Parivar, former Union Minister Raghunath Jha resigned from his post and primary membership of the party and announced that he would join the SP. Jha also accused RJD president of ignoring senior leaders in a bid to promote his family members in the party.

Meanwhile, senior BJP leader and Union Minister Rajiv Pratap Rudy has hinted that Jha would be a part of the NDA. “We have Paswan, Kushwaha, Manjhi, <g data-gr-id="43">Gyanu</g> (a former JDU leader), and now Jha would also become the part of NDA as he has left RJD,” Rudy said, adding that NCP has already opted out of this alliance and now SP, who was tasked to lead the merger of all splinters of Janata Parivar.