Bihar netas flirt with 'sex aur dhoka'

The killing, which appeared a sort of replica of recent Bollywood movie ‘Love, sex aur dhoka,’ has sent shock waves across the state, but old-timers recall that extra-marital fling is not uncommon for Bihar leaders. And, barring the Left, no other political party has been left untouched with the ‘third angle’.

The most famous of all was Shilpi Jain murder case, which hogged the limelight for several years. RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s wayward brother-in-law Sadhu Yadav was the prime suspect. Shilpi’s semi-nude body was recovered from a car in a garage along with her boy friend Gautam, a small-time RJD leader, in Patna. After the opposition and public uproar, a CBI probe was ordered.

CBI clean chit

Sadhu, wielding enormous clout during Rabri Devi’s chief ministership, refused to undergo a DNA test. No amount of media trail could nail him down. Eventually, after years of investigation, the CBI gave Sadhu, then a Lok Sabha member, a clean chit and concluded that Shilpi and Gautam had committed suicide.

In another instance, a Janata Dal MLA Yogendra Narayan Sardar was castrated by the victim when he made an unsuccessful attempt to rape a dalit girl. The matter came to light when he had to undergo treatment at a private nursing home in Patna. The then chief minister Rabri Devi had rewarded the girl for showing enormous courage and resisting rape attempt.

But the one which drew maximum attention of national and international print media (that time there was no TV, barring black and white Doordarshan) was the Bobby murder case in 1980 in which several Youth Congress leaders, including the son of a former Speaker, was said to be involved.

Bobby’s original name was Shwetnisha Trivedi, and she worked as a telephone operator in the secretariat. Extremely beautiful, but equally ambitious, she had her share of short name and fame. But the dalliance with the khadi-clad netas cost her dearly, as she was found murdered under mysterious circumstances in Patna.

The then senior SP of Patna, Kishore Kunal, an upright IPS officer, got the body of Bobby exhumed so as to nail the real culprit. As he was about to book the son of a top Congress leader holding a constitutional post, the then Bihar chief minister Jagannath Mishra gave him the marching orders. Once Kunal was shunted out of Patna, the murder case was given a quiet burial.

Polygamy

Prior to that, former chief minister Karpoori Thakur too was charged with polygamy in the 70s when his so-called girl friend (a Nepalese woman) reportedly used to call the shots, and had virtually become another power centre.

Tongues started wagging when firebrand Socialist leader George Fernandes too was charged with adultery after his estranged wife Laila Fernandes moved out of his house.

In subsequent years, the entry of Jaya Jaitley into George’s residence was the staple diet for rumour mongers. Her elevation as Samata Party president only added to the grist of rumour mill.

More recently, a Janata Dal (U) legislator Abhay Singh gunned down his wife before shooting himself and his daughter after he was charged with adultery. Before dying he scribbled a few words which said, “The charges levelled against me are not true.”

Since he was son of an influential cabinet minister in Nitish Kumar government, the case, like many others in the past, was swept under the carpet.