PATNA: Jailed Lalu Prasad Yadav chief Lalu Prasad Yadav’s elder son Tej Pratap Yadav on Wednesday asked his supporters to reach New Delhi in large numbers for a demonstration at Jantar Mantar on January 9 to demand the release of Lalu’s from jail.
Describing the imprisonment of the RJD chief following his conviction in the fodder scam cases as a “conspiracy by BJP and RSS,” Tej Pratap asked the party’s supporters to get organised to give a befitting reply to this “gross injustice” in the coming Lok Sabha polls and the Bihar Assembly polls in 2020.
“All of you must reach Jantar Mantar in Delhi in large numbers on January 9. Jantar Mantar is Kurukshetra; it is Hastinapur. I will be there with my ‘sudarshan chakra’,” said the 30-year-old first-time MLA and former minister at a demonstration by RJD workers in Patna to protest against the conviction and imprisonment of the party chief.
RJD’s youth workers staged demonstrations at all district headquarters towns on Wednesday to demand the release of the party chief from jail. Lalu Prasad Yadav has been handed jail terms for 27 years and a half by special CBI courts in Ranchi that found him guilty in four cases of Bihar’s 22-year-old, Rs 1,000-crore fodder scam.
Tej Pratap, who filed for divorce from his wife of six months in November and has since been staying away from his parents’ residence, became active in politics earlier this week by holding meetings at the party office to redress the grievances of party workers.
“People claiming that there is a rift between me and my younger brother Tejashwi are vested interests spreading lies. My aim is to make sure that Tejashwi becomes chief minister. I am ready to say this in writing on stamp paper,” said Tej Pratap.
Sources said he and Tejashwi Yadav, a former deputy chief minister who is currently the Leader of Opposition in Bihar Assembly, are not on talking terms. “Tejashwi has been avoiding Tej Pratap’s political programmes. He also gets no formal information about his elder brother’s programmes,” said an RJD leader familiar with the developments in the party.