5 LJP MPs ‘dump’ Chirag, elect Paras as party president

PATNA: The political script being written in Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) since the announcement of Bihar assembly elections last year reached its climax with a coup in the party Sunday night.
Five of the six Lok Sabha members of LJP “dumped” party president and Jamui MP Chirag Paswan under the leadership of Hajipur MP Pashupati Kumar Paras, the brother of party founder late Ram Vilas Paswan.
The five MPs submitted their signed letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, who on Monday accepted their plea and named Paras as the LJP leader in the House in place of Chirag. The Lok Sabha secretariat issued a circular in this regard in the afternoon.
Chandan Kumar, the LJP MP from Nawada and brother of don-turned-politician and former MP Surajbhan Singh, on Monday told TOI from Delhi that Paras has been elected the parliamentary party leader of the party in the Lok Sabha. “We have made him the party president as well. The party is intact. Only the leadership has changed,” he said.
There are, however, technicalities involved whether the party has split 21 years after Ram Vilas laid its foundation or only Chirag has been left in the lurch, as Paras said he has saved the LJP by his decision rather than breaking it.
“We had no option. The party was in disarray and on the verge of losing its existence. Chirag was the party president and he is welcome to remain in the party,” said Paras, who did not meet Chirag when the latter visited his house on Monday reportedly with an offer to step down and make his mother Reena Paswan the party president.
The move has also put a question mark on the survival of smaller parties as former Union minister Upendra Kushwaha recently merged his RLSP with JD(U) and CM Nitish Kumar made him the president of the party's parliamentary board. Even the state’s lone BSP MLA, Jama Khan, joined JD(U) and became a minister in the Nitish cabinet.
The sudden political development amid speculation of Union cabinet expansion is significant. The BJP central leadership as well as Nitish’s JD(U) is in a win-win situation as they will be no more in a dilemma about accommodating LJP’s Paras in the central cabinet after the death of Ram Vilas, who was the cabinet minister in the Modi government till he breathed his last.
Had Chirag been at the helm of the party affairs in the Lok Sabha, BJP would have found it difficult to accommodate him in the ministry at the cost of inviting the ire of its now largest ally JD(U) and its leader Nitish. Significantly, Paras praised Nitish at a press meet in Delhi on Monday and said LJP was and will remain a part of the NDA.
Taking a swipe at Chirag, JD(U) national president RCP Singh said, “As you sow, so you reap. Chirag was heading a party which was with the NDA. Yet, he took a stand that damaged his party in the state assembly elections.”
Vaishali MP Veena Devi also told TOI over the phone that all the LJP Lok Sabha members, except Chirag, signed the letter to the Speaker in favour of Paras. “We contested the Lok Sabha election as an NDA partner and all MPs want development in their constituencies. There is no break-up in LJP,” she said, pointing out that the grass is greener on Nitish’s side.
In fact, the LJP MPs in any form are important for BJP as it could ill-afford to lose them in the possible case of PM Modi’s ‘Hanuman’ (Chirag) joining hands with the opposition after denial of a cabinet berth in the next expansion. LJP, minus Chirag but Ram Vilas’s brother Paras and nephew Prince Raj (Samastipur MP) at the helm, will suit JD(U) also because of the party’s vote bank among the 4% Paswans in Bihar. The fifth LJP MP to support Paras is Choudhary Mehboob Ali Kaiser from Khagaria.
Either Chirag fell prey to the political power game of BJP before the assembly elections by opposing Nitish’s policies and decisions to the extent of saying that he will be jailed on corruption charges and fielded his candidates, including some important “rival BJP men” on 115 seats against his party JD(U) or acted oversmart without assessing his ground reality. LJP could win only one seat in the assembly elections and, later, its lone MLA too joined JD(U), which had lost at least 30 assembly seats to RJD and its allies due to Chirag and had to finish as the junior partner of BJP, which won 74 seats against JD(U)’s 43 only.
In fact, LJP had somehow skipped a split before the Bihar assembly elections as most of the rank and file were not in tune with Chirag’s political line to oppose Nitish, but they remained with him under the dilemma that weakening of JD(U) and boosting the chances of BJP electorally will ultimately be rewarding for the party.