Four days before the culmination of the Rahul Gandhi-led Bharat Jodo Yatra, Rajiv Ranjan ‘Lalan’ Singh, the national president of the Congress’s Bihar ally Janata Dal (United), informed his counterpart in the grand old party it will not be possible for him to join the concluding ceremony of the nationwide march.
Singh informed Mallikarjun Kharge he has to attend a JD(U) programme in poll-bound Nagaland on the same day as the final day of the Bharat Jodo Yatra (January 30).
“…Much as I’d like to be present at the historic event, I express my inability to do so, as I need to be present at the launching of the party’s election campaign at Wokha, Nagaland the same day,” the JD(U) leader communicated to Kharge, according to news agency ANI.
After this, it is not clear whether Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s outfit will send another representative, or skip the event altogether. The development, however, comes at a time when there is tension within the state’s ruling Mahagathbandhan, over remarks on Ramcharitmanas by RJD leader and education minister Chandra Shekhar, and senior JD(U) leader Upendra Kushwaha allegedly trying to join the BJP.
In August last year, Nitish Kumar snapped ties with the BJP and joined Mahagathbandhan, returning to an alliance he quit in July 2017 to join hands with the saffron party.
Meanwhile, the Bharat Jodo Yatra, through which the Congress says it ‘aims to unite India,’ began on September 7 last year in Tamil Nadu’s Kanyakumari. After travelling through a dozen states and covering more than 3,000 kms, the march entered Jammu and Kashmir on January 19. Eight days earlier, party president Kharge had written to as many as twenty-one ‘like-minded’ parties, inviting them to join the conclusion of the Yatra, in Srinagar.
