Ahead of electoral battle in Bihar, RJD, NDA engage in social media war

Patna: The NDA and the RJD, the two main rivals in politics of Bihar, where assembly polls are due in a few months, on Saturday made the use of social media and animation technology to pin each other down.

On its X handle, the RJD, which hopes that its young leader Tejashwi Yadav will rise to power, trained its guns at Chief Minister and JD(U) supremo Nitish Kumar.

In an animated video, with a background commentary rendered like a "rap" number, Kumar has been called "paltu" (a turncoat) whose "baate hain faltu" (talks nonsense).

Notably, the longest-serving CM of Bihar has also had two short-lived alliances with the RJD, headed by his arch rival Lalu Prasad, and Yadav, the latter's younger son and heir apparent, occupied the post of deputy chief minister on both occasions.

Now in the opposition, the RJD minced no words in voicing its frustration, as it wondered whether the septuagenarian had allegedly applied "fevicol" to his seat of power, to retain it despite "political somersaults".

Although the barbs were aimed at the JD(U) supremo, it was the alliance partner BJP, known to have superior machinery, that came forward to pay the opponent in the same coin.

The saffron party's Bihar unit came out with two videos on its X handle to deride Prasad and his family, who controls the opposition party.

In one of these, Prasad and his two sons, Tejashwi and Tej Pratap, have been shown to be riding an autorickshaw, with the driver showing them the "vikas" (development) that has taken place in the last two decades.

The trio is later shown to have been miffed, asking the driver to stop as they did not wish to be taken for a ride by an alleged "NDA supporter".

Yet another video has been titled "Gangs of Ghotalebaz", an obvious parody of "Gangs of Wassrypur", a blockbuster film about the mafia culture that once prevailed in mineral-rich parts of undivided Bihar, now in Jharkhand.

Lots of morphed videos and photos of Lalu and Tejashwi figure in the video, with a parody of a 1980s Bollywood number, describing the various "scams" (ghotala) the father-son duo has been accused of.