Nitish, Lalu all smiles at first meeting in Bihar since Mahagathbandhan govt in action

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday met Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav for the first time since his party rekindled ties with the latter to form a new government in the eastern state.

Bihar deputy chief minister Tejaswhi Yadav shared pictures of the meeting between the two leaders on Twitter that showed Kumar and Prasad exchanging a few red roses.

Tejashwi, who is Prasad’s son, and his brother, Tej Pratap, were in attendance during the meeting, besides the RJD boss’s wife Rabri Devi.

“Respected chief minister Nitish Kumar ji reached to meet national president [of RJD] Lalu Prasad Yadav,” Tejashwi’s message on the micro-blogging site read.

Prasad was accorded a grand welcome in Patna by RJD leaders and workers earlier in the evening when he reached the state capital from New Delhi. Soon after, he chaired a meeting with ministers of the newly formed government and RJD legislators at Devi’s official residence, and reminded them of the task they have been allotted under the changed regime, a senior RJD leader said.

Prasad, who is recovering from a shoulder fracture, was discharged from AIIMS, New Delhi, on July 22. He was airlifted to the national capital for treatment after suffering the fracture at his residence in Patna in July. He was released on bail in April last year in the fodder scam case, and has been mostly living at the residence of his daughter and Rajya Sabha member Misa Bharti in Delhi, returning to Patna only for brief spells.

Bharti accompanied her father during his journey from Delhi to Patna.

Meanwhile, the BJP in the opposition in Bihar, has been lambasting the new Kumar-Tejashwi government over reports that many new inductees, including law minister Kartikeya Singh, have criminal charges registered against them.

BJP MP Sushil Kumar Modi and former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad have urged Kumar to sack Singh from the cabinet. However, when asked by reporters earlier in the day about Singh’s criminal background, the Bihar chief minister said he has “no information” about the same.

Singh reportedly was supposed to surrender before the Danapur court on August 16 in a kidnapping case — the say he was sworn in as Bihar’s new law minister. His advocate Madhusudan Sharma, however, quashed accusations of his client absconding in the kidnapping case as “baseless”.