Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav is set to show the nation today that the lakhs who attend his rally - or raila, for that macho touch - stand by him even if he is charged in the multi-crore fodder scam.
That being the political message, his critics in other parties have targetted Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda and other Janata Dal (JD) leaders, including party working president Sharad Yadav and railway minister Ram Vilas Paswan, for deciding to attend. Gowda directly supervises the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is investigating the fodder scam.
A rally is held annually on March 18 to commemorate the total revolution launched by Jai Prakash Narayan and parliamentary affairs minister Srikanta Jena argues that Gowdas presence at the rally has nothing to do with the fodder scam cases.The fact, though, is that even JD leaders privately share the concern that it could send wrong signals to the investigating agencies and the courts. They fear the negative political message about the party.
Even the Dals Left partners have agitated publicly against Yadav. And Samajwadi Party leader Pappu Yadav has filed a writ pleading that the court stop the rally. He wrote to Gowda yesterday to say the SPs relations with the United Front (UF) would suffer if Gowda attended. The Bharatiya Janata Partys (BJP) began to reap political benefits of the rally yesterday with a march to President Shankar Dayal Sharma. The partys state leader Sushil Modi told the President that the state machinery had been misused for the rally, that Rs 10 crore had been spent on it, the state helicopter deployed, and that Dal workers were extorting funds from businessmen, petrol pumps and shopkeepers.
Indeed, virtually every minister, MLAs and small time leaders of the ruling Janata Dal are playing host to the rallyists. Shopkeepers downed shutters to keep out rampaging party workers. Fuel stations closed to avoid providing free petrol and diesel to rally vehicles. Some senior Dal leaders argue that they must go for the sake of the party, though they know it is only a matter of time before a new Chief Minister will have to be installed. One of them said that the Dal would find its dark horse in Bihar the way Gowda had emerged from nowhere to become the Prime Minister.
