Senior BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi today claimed that the RJD supremo Lalu Prasad would not have received the telephone call of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi had he known about the identity of the caller in advance.
"Prasad would not have taken Modi's phone call to enquire about his health if he had known in advance that it was the Gujarat Chief Minister who would be speaking to him," Sushil Modi told reporters.
"The injured RJD supremo thought that it was I who had called him to enquire about his health and not the other Modi," the Deputy Chief Minister claimed.
"I did speak to him later in the day on Saturday and found out about his condition," Modi said.
He said that it was a courtesy to call leaders of other parties to congratulate them or sympathise with them from time to time and added that he considered it as a duty to do so having worked in Prasad's team in the Patna University Students' Union in early 1970s before the two parted ways in public life.
The RJD supremo had sustained injuries in a freak accident while travelling in a four-wheeler to Raghopur in Vaishali district on Friday night and required two stitches in the head on the fateful night.
The Gujarat Chief Minister was among the earliest callers to enquire about Prasad's health condition, a development that the latter himself made public even though the former tweeted about his telephonic conversation with the RJD supremo.
Interestingly, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar did not speak to his arch rival to find out about the latter's condition and said yesterday that he did not consider to do so as he had found out about Prasad's well being from officials.
