Nitish Kumar on Wednesday sent a tough message to district unit functionaries ahead of the second leg of his Sampark Yatra commencing on December 15.

The party leadership has decided to change JDU presidents in four districts, apparently, for their 'poor performance' during the first phase of the Sampark Yatra meetings.

In the first leg, Nitish started his Sampark Yatra from West Champaran district headquarters of Bettiah on November 13. Before that he spoke to the party's elected representatives and specifically assigned them work to be carried out on the ground during his outing at the grass-roots level.

Sources in the party said Nitish was not particularly happy with the turnout at his Sampark Yatra meetings in Saran (November 15), Madhubani (November 17), Samastipur (November 18) and Buxar (November 27). He had expected better. The Sampark Yatra meetings were specifically designed to ensure Nitish's direct contact with cadres.

'District presidents were given the task of making the organisation stronger in their respective districts. For now, only four district presidents are being changed. But more heads could roll in the final assessment to be carried out by the state party chief,' a senior JDU leader said on condition of anonymity.

Three of the district presidents - Krishna Kumar alias Mantu Singh (Chhapra), Santosh Kumar Nirala (Rajpur in Buxar), Ashok Kumar (Warisnagar-Samastipur) and MLC Udaykant Choudhary (Madhubani) - are MLAs.

When The Telegraph contacted Santosh Kumar Nirala, he denied the Sampark Yatra was a poor show in his area. He said: 'For the past three months I had been appealing to the leadership to relieve me from the post of JDU district president because I have to prepare myself for the upcoming Assembly election. I am not being replaced because of any poor performance. Sampark Yatra was a big hit in Buxar.'

JDU spokesperson and MLC Neeraj Kumar has a different take on the development. 'The MLAs and MLCs are overburdened and that's the reason the baton is being passed on to someone else so that the functioning of the party goes on smoothly,' Singh said.

The action against the district functionaries assumes importance as in the second leg of Sampark Yatra, Nitish would be visiting Khagaria, Madhepura and Saharsa, aiming to galvanise party cadres who are believed to be demoralised in the wake of the JDU's huge debacle against the BJP-led NDA in the Lok Sabha elections in May. The JDU won just two seats against the BJP-led NDA's 31.

The schedule for Nitish's Sampark Yatra visit to Jamui has not yet been finalised.

Speaking on the issue of changing district presidents, JDU state unit president Basishtha Narayan Singh said he would soon announce the list of new district presidents.

The decision is important because it is probably Nitish's first yatra where he has focused more on cadre and organisation.

In the last leg of his Yatra, he would try his level best to motivate party workers.

In the first phase of Sampark Yatra, Nitish covered 34 districts. He restricted his speeches to attacking Prime Minister Narendra Modi, even playing recordings of Modi's speeches during the 2014 Lok Sabha election campaign.

He particularly played audio tapes of Narendra Modi's pre-election speeches in which he had promised to bring back black money stashed in foreign banks. He had said there was enough money abroad to deposit Rs 15 lakh in the bank account of every poor Indian.