Three RJD MLAs joined the Nitesh Kumar led JD(U) party on Monday, ahead of the Bihar assembly elections.Maheshwar Prasad Yadav, who represents the Gaighat assembly segment in Muzaffarpur, Prema Choudhary, MLA of Patepur in Vaishali, and Ashok Kumar Kushwaha, the legislator of Sasaram in Rohtas, switched the party.
They joined the Janta Dal in presence of senior leader and states Energy Minister, Bijendra Prasad Yadav at the JD(U) office.
While the RJD party expelled two MLAs on Sunday- Yadav and Choudhary , Kushwaha quit the Lalu Prasad”s party hours before joining the JD(U).
However, the RJD”s Rohtas district unit, claimed that they expelled Kushwaha from the party because of his anti-party activities.
The RJD party also have expelled Faraz Fatmi, the MLA from Keoti in Darbhanga district, but he did not joined the JD(U) along with his three colleagues as he is currently out of the station, according to the sources.
He is the son of former Union minister, Mohammad Ali Ashraf Fatmi, who had quit the RJD ahead of the Lok Sabha elections of 2019 after being denied a ticket.
Fatmi senior is currently in JD(U).
The three MLAs who joined the JD(U) on Monday expressed their full faith in the leadership of Kumar’s party and they said that the work of his government inspired them to switch the sides.
Welcoming the MLAs to the party , the minister said that, These MLAs had fought the assembly elections under the leadership of Nitish Kumar in 2015 and hence they have come back to their leader.
Nitesh Kumar, who is the JD(U) national president, had formed an alliance ahead of the 2015 assembly elections with Prasad , giving up on years of bitter political hostility. The ”Grand Alliance” also included the Congress and their coalition made them win the elections with a thumping majority.
Although Kumar returned as chief minister, Lalu Prasad”s younger son Tejashwi Yadav was appointed as deputy CM.
However, Kumar grew uneasy after the allegations of corruption and money laundering cases against Tejashwi and several members of the Prasad family, including his wife and former chief minister Rabri Devi.
The JD(U) chief walked out of the coalition with RJD in July 2017, asserting that he could not make any compromise on the issue of corruption, though formed a new government with the BJP party, a party with which Kumar had snapped more than a decade old political tie in 2013.
The Bihar assembly elections is due in October-November.
