Patna, Feb. 21: The rulers of Bihar did not take Lalu Prasad’s recent demand to rename Patna as Azimabad seriously but the railway minister made an attempt to fulfil his dream today by flagging off a train named after a part of the old city.

Barely three hours later, the BJP’s new spokesperson, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, began talking about the “fiction” of Lalu Prasad bringing about a turnaround in the railways during his tenure.

The Union minister recently reverted to his earlier practice of launching new trains from Bihar apart from inaugurating better railway facilities across the state.

The schedule was partly disrupted for a day because of the attack on the Samjhauta Express, with the railway minister going ahead with his launch routine yesterday and today.

The weekly Azimabad Express would connect Patna with Ahmedabad, Bihar’s new link with Gujarat, home to a sizeable migrant labour population from the state.

But Rudy, whom Lalu Prasad trounced in Chhapra even after the Election Commission nullified the first round of polling in 2004, said “all talks of his opponent improving the fortunes of the railways were a farce”.

“It is a coincidence that railways is the only department where the minister is not the CEO. This is so because the railways is actually run by the Railway Board and not the minister concerned. Lalu Prasad has little to contribute in whatever has happened in the railways,” Rudy charged.

The BJP politician said there has been no improvement in passenger amenities on trains. “Railways is a different case because of its organisational set-up. I am certain that had Lalu Prasad been the in-charge of any other ministry, the story would have been no different from what he did in Bihar for 15 years,” he added.

Rudy, a former civil aviation minister, utilised the moment to claim that the “air revolution” was any day a better story than what happened in the railways and claimed credit for the decline in air fares.

“Air fares went down because we brought about basic changes in the system. The NDA government had a major role to play in that success story. No such reforms have been brought about in the railways,” he claimed.

Lalu Prasad had demanded a change of name from Patna to Azimabad, saying it would be a fitting tribute to Muslim politician Ghulam Sarwar. But renaming Patna as Patliputra has generally found favour with the NDA leaders, although there has been no official announcement to that effect.