Patna: Former Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi suffered a major political loss as she was deprived of her status as Leader of Opposition in Bihar Legislative Council on Tuesday as five out of eight RJD MLCs deserted the party and joined the ruling JDU.
Chairman of the Council, Awadesh Narain Singh said the five RJD MLCs who left the party have been allowed membership in JDU. They are Sanjay Prasad, Radhacharan Sheth, Dilip Rai, Md Kamar Alam and Ran Vijay Singh.
According to a notification issued by the Council secretary Vinod Kumar, these legislators were elected in 2015 and 2016 from local bodies constituencies and assembly constituency. They submitted their papers and expressed their willingness to join JDU and handed over a letter to the chief whip of the ruling party Reena devi.
The chairman met the five MLCs individually and then allowed them to join JDU.
All the five MLCs later went to Chief Minister’s residence and expressed their support to the leadership of Nitish Kumar, who is also the national president of the party.
RJD suffered another set back in the day, as its national vice-president Raghuwansh Prasad Singh announced he was resigning as the vice-president.
In a statement issued from the corona isolation ward in AIIMS here, Raghuwansh Prasad Singh, a former union minister for rural development said he was hurt that money was playing its role in RJD. He said he was unhappy that Rama Singh, a former MP of LJP, who had contested against him (Raghuwansh), was admitted in RJD by Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.
Rama Singh is considered a Bahubali in North Bihar politics and had defeated Raghuwansh in 2014 Lok Sabha elections. He was in Durg jail(Chhattisgarh) on alleged charges of kidnapping a businessman for ransom.
Raghuwansh said he had communicated to the party president, Lalu Prasad Yadav and suggested Rama Singh should not be allowed entry into RJD.
RJD has nominated three people as its candidates for the biennial elections to the Vidhan Parishad. Two of them are leading persons in co-operative movement and industry. RJD workers from Vaishali demonstrated outside the bungalow of Rabri Devi and demanded nomination of the former MLC Bhola Rai.
