Finally, Lalu appoints sons as his “political heirs”

After months of deliberations, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad has finally handed over the reins of his party to both his minister-sons, Tej Pratap Yadav and Tejashwi Yadav, amid opposition accusations of indulging in “dynastic politics”.

Tejashwi is the deputy chief minister in the ruling Nitish Kumar government while Tej Pratap is the health minister.

Prasad who has been disqualified from contesting elections after his conviction in the multimillion dollar fodder scam made this announcement at his party’s training camp on Tuesday evening. The three-day training camp of the RJD being organised at Rajgir in Nalanda concluded on Thursday.

“After me, Tej Pratap and Tejashwi will lead the party,” Prasad told the audience at the training camp. Some of the notables present in the audience were Prasad’s own ambitious daughter and parliamentarian Misa Bharti, party vice-president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, Jagadanand Singh and Prabhunath Singh.

The announcement comes at a time when Prasad’s daughter Bharti was being considered far ahead in the race to be his political heir. But she reacted with maturity. “Sons get the mantle, that’s the tradition here,” she told the media.

Analysts say she was in the race till the last 2014 Lok Sabha elections. How she remained the ‘favoured’ candidate is underlined from the fact that the RJD gave her the ticket for the prestigious Patliputra seat in Patna at the cost of his loyalist Ram Kripal Yadav, now a minister in the ruling Narendra Modi government at the centre.

Last year, the RJD chief had expelled party parliamentarian Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav after he claimed to be his “natural heir”. Yadav who was one of the four RJD parliamentarians had been elected from Madhepura Lok Sabha seat.

Experts say the RJD chief has tried his best to keep peace in the family by declaring both his sons as his “political heirs” instead of rooting for one although he is said to be heavily inclined towards his deputy CM son Tejashwi. According to them, Prasad wants to settle them in politics at all cost before it’s too late.

Although the main opposition BJP accused the RJD president of pursuing “dynastic politics”, such things are nothing new to Indian politics.

Earlier former Haryana chief minister late Chaudhary Devi Lal had appointed his son Om Prakash Chautala as his heir. Very recently, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) chief M Karunanidhi anointed his son MK Stalin his heir apparent. Samajwadi Party (SP) patron Mulayam Singh Yadav too quietly passed his rein on to his son Akhilesh Yadav.

source: GULF NEWS