Lalu woos his voters, stumps Congress

RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s wooing of his Yadav voters at Sunday’s grand alliance rally and sharp attack on upper castes has left Congress leaders squirming.

Congress leaders from poll-bound Bihar had put in Herculean efforts to mobilise crowd for RJD-JDU-SP-Congress joint rally on Sunday that was also addressed by party president Sonia Gandhi.

However, a section of the party leadership felt that the rally ended up being a Lalu Prasad show with the RJD boss going all out to woo his core Muslim-Yadav voter base and attacking the upper castes. The upper castes have been traditional voters of the BJP and the Congress.

“Lalu Prasad was addressing his constituency. He has put across his views,” Bihar Congress chief Ashok Chaudhary said here. State Congress leaders met party president Sonia Gandhi and her deputy Rahul Gandhi and updated them about the response to the rally.

 A section of the leaders was of the view that Lalu’s strong pitch for his voter base in the presence of Sonia Gandhi could affect the Congress fortunes in the Bihar Assembly elections.

In the 2010 Assembly elections, the Congress had garnered 8.37 per cent votes and won four seats.

The Congress is banking on its performance in the Bihar Assembly elections for its revival after the severe drubbing it received at the hands of Narendra Modi in the Lok Sabha elections last year.

Though Sonia shared the stage with Lalu Prasad and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Rahul has been reluctant to be seen in the company of the RJD supremo who has been convicted in the fodder scam.

Chaudhary on Tuesday dismissed as “BJP propaganda” reports about Rahul’s reluctance to share the stage with Lalu Prasad.

“Rahulji will be our star campaigner. If required, all the leaders of the grand alliance will come together on a common stage,” Chaudhary said.

The Congress is contesting 40 seats in the 243-member Bihar assembly and hopes to at least reach the double digit mark.