Four months after Ram Vilas Paswan’s death, LJP heading for a vertical split

There is more bad news for Lok Janshakti Party chief Chirag Paswan. After being decimated in Bihar Assembly polls and thrown out of the NDA in November last, the LJP is now heading for a vertical split with several leaders all set to join the ruling Janata Dal (United) on February 18.

The JD (U) national president and Rajya Sabha member RCP Singh will be present in the party office on Thursday when the former LJP spokesperson Keshav Singh and many others will formally join Nitish Kumar’s regional outfit.

The meeting of the LJP Lok Sabha member Chandan Singh with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar recently too raised many an eyebrow but both the sides claimed that “it was a courtesy call and one should not read politics into each and every meeting between two politicians.”

Keshav Singh, who was the first to raise a bogey of revolt against Chirag Paswan, has charged the LJP chief with misappropriation of party fund, collected on the eve of Bihar Assembly poll.

“After Ram Vilas Paswan’s death in October, Chirag, during the poll campaign, used to say that he wanted to send Nitish to jail on corruption charges. But the fact is the LJP chief himself will soon be booked for irregularities in the party fund, collected mostly from the loyal party leaders and workers,” said Keshav, now ousted from the LJP.

He claimed that Chirag’s slogan of ‘Bihar first, Bihari first’ has now changed to ‘Money first, Punjabi first’. Although the expelled LJP leader did not name anyone, his remarks were in an oblique reference to late Paswan’s second wife who is from Punjab.

Notably, the LJP, which won just one seat in the November Assembly polls in Bihar, was instrumental in the defeat of several JD (U) candidates, thereby forcing Nitish to play second fiddle to the BJP.