RCP Singh joins Jan Suraaj.
Credit: PTI photo
Patna: Former Janata Dal (United) national president and ex-Union Minister RCP Singh on Sunday joined Prashant Kishor’s newly-floated political outfit Jan Suraaj in Patna.
RCP, widely known as former aide of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, is a retired IAS officer of UP cadre. Hailing from Nalanda, the home town of Nitish, RCP came into contact with him when the latter became the Union Railway Minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Cabinet.
Eventually, in 2005, when Nitish took over as Bihar CM, he made RCP Singh the Principal Secretary to the CM.
However, in 2010, RCP took voluntary retirement and joined Nitish’s party. Such was his close association with Nitish that RCP was subsequently awarded with two terms in the Rajya Sabha and also elevated as the national president of the JD (U), which caused jealousy among Nitish’s old loyalists.
During the second term in the Rajya Sabha, RCP served as Union Minister for Steel as Nitish’s nominee in the Narendra Modi Cabinet. However, by this time, his differences with Nitish started cropping up, following which he had to step down as the Union Minister. Later, he was removed as the JD (U) national president too and eventually shown the door from the party he once headed.
An old bureaucrat, but a novice politician who lacked mass base, RCP had a brief tryst with the BJP too when he joined the saffron camp in 2023. However, when Nitish rejoined hands with the BJP after dumping Mahagatbandhan in January 2024, RCP was tactically sidelined within the BJP, forcing him to float his own political outfit: ‘Aap Sabki Awaaz’.
On Sunday, RCP announced in the presence of Prashant Kishor that he was merging his political party 'Aap Sabki Awaaz' with that of PK’s Jan Suraaj. “Both of us have worked with Nitish ji earlier. Now, both of us will work together to get Bihar rid of Nitish,” said RCP, flanked by PK.