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Rahul Gandhi to address Bihar rally today without Lalu, Nitish

by IBNS 18 Sep 2015, 08:08 pm

Patna, Sept 19 (IBNS) Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi will go it alone in his public meeting in Bihar's West Champaran district on Saturday as allies Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar chose not to attend it.

The Congress is in alliance with Lalu Prasad's Rashtriya Janata Dal and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal United against the Bharatiya Janata Party in the upcoming  Bihar Assembly polls.

Lalu said earlier this week that his son, Tejaswi Yadav, will represent the Rashtriya Janata Dal at Rahul's rally, while the JDU said Nitish Kumar is likely to address a press conference with Gandhi on Saturday. 

The Congress said the public address is not specific to the Bihar election, but part of a countrywide commemoration of Dr BR Ambedkar's 125th birth anniversary.

However, the absence of two top regional leaders in Rahul's  rally is likely to send a negative message to the people about the grand alliance that aims at resisting the BJP in Bihar.

In 2013, an effort by the then Manmohan Singh government to protect Lalu from being disqualified as a parliamentarian after being convicted in a corruption case was negated by Rahul.  He rejected an ordinance that would have shielded Lalu, a move that the RJD apparently has reasons to grouse about.