BJP and JD(U) supporters clash with each other at Beer Chand Patel Marg on Tuesday. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Allies till June 16, the BJP and the JD(U) workers fought like bitter foes on Beer Chand Patel Marg on Tuesday.

The street dotted with the state headquarters of several political parties, including the JD(U) and the BJP, turned into a battlefield around 10.36am when 50 Dal supporters marched towards the BJP office in protest against the latter’s bandh call. The workers of both the parties rained blows on each other after trying to snatch flags. The clash lasted for almost 15 minutes, leaving a few bleeding. The violence continued till Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Manu Maharaj reached the spot around 10.50am.

The supporters of the two parties allegedly clashed in Muzaffarpur also.

Tension was palpable at the nerve centre of political activities in the city right from the morning on the bandh day, also observed as Vishwasghat Divas by the BJP. The flashpoint was the march of the JD(U) workers towards the BJP office. Spotting them around 200m away from their party office, the BJP activists started abusing them. One among them shouted: “Arre dekho, JD(U) wale idhar aa rahe hai, aaj inko chhorenge nahi (See, the JD-U supporters are coming, won’t spare them today).”

Picking up bamboo sticks, the BJP workers lividly started marching towards the team of JD(U) activists, led by party spokesperson Rajiv Ranjan Prasad. Just 100m away from their party office, the BJP supporters started beating up the JD(U) workers. Some of them covered their faces to conceal their identity.

Around 15 BJP supporters attacked a JD(U) worker, later identified as Rajesh Kumar Dablu. Hit hard on his forehead with a bamboo stick, he started bleeding on the spot.

The supporters of both the parties tried to snatch flags of each other but the BJP workers easily outnumbered their JD(U) counterparts.

Gauging the angry mood of the BJP supporters, the JD(U) activists started retreating towards their own office. The BJP workers gave them a chase and beat up a few. Around 12 Dal workers suffered injuries.

Prasad, the JD(U) spokesperson, could not run. Around three BJP workers hit him eight times with bamboo sticks. Prasad kept on saying “it’s wrong, don’t do it”, but the BJP workers chased him almost up to the JD(U) office.

Prasad later said: “It was just a protest march and we had no intention to provoke them. We were peacefully protesting. They (BJP supporters) are the ones who started beating us first.”

The BJP and the RJD, on the other hand, claimed that taking out a protest march on a bandh day was a mistake on the part of the JD(U).

The RJD chief, Lalu Prasad, also condemned the clash. He alleged that chief minister Nitish Kumar incited his leaders to hit the streets.

The BJP state unit chief, Mangal Pandey, said: “There was no need to take out any protest march when the BJP officially called Bihar bandh. Our workers were protesting peacefully and they (JD-U supporters) attacked our office.”

The vociferous BJP workers took guard on Beer Chand Patel Marg much before the party’s top leaders arrived. They started tying bandanas having the party symbol on their foreheads in front of the BJP office around 9.15am.

Giving slogans like “Desh ka neta kaisa ho? Narendra Modi jaisa ho (How should be leader of the country? He should be like Narendra Modi)”, they started stopping vehicles. They also placed burning tyres at five places on the roads.

Against this backdrop, top BJP leaders started reaching the party office to participate in Vishwashghat Divas. The first to arrive was the state BJP president, Mangal Pandey. After a few minutes, the national spokesperson of the BJP, Syed Shahnawaz Hussain, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Rajiv Pratap Rudy and former road construction minister Nand Kishore Yadav reached the venue.

When former deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi arrived around 9.25am, the BJP workers welcomed him screaming “Bihar ka mukhya mantri kaisa ho? Sushil Modi jaisa ho (How should be Bihar’s chief minister? He should be like Sushil Modi).

Amid all these, some BJP workers spotted a poster of JD(U) spokesperson Rajiv Ranjan Prasad across the road. Wasting no time, they started tearing it with bamboo sticks.

When the top BJP leaders were charting the route of the march to impose the strike inside the party office, the BJP activists tried to damage the vehicle of the erstwhile NDA chief whip, Shravan Kumar. Fortunately, the leader was not inside the car. Its driver pressed the accelerator pedal up to its maximum limit and fled the scene.

A postal van going to the General Post Office also had to face the rage of the BJP workers. They party activists tried to break the glass but they could not succeed.

“Don’t you know that we have called bandh today? I will slap you so hard that you will not able to open your mouth for several days,” a BJP worker told the van’s driver.

An elderly man on his way to the railway station and a rickshaw-puller were their next targets. The rickshaw-puller ran away, leaving the elderly man alone. Scared, the senior citizen also fled with his luggage.

Around 50 BJP workers stopped a private bus transporting policemen and started hitting it with bamboo sticks. They relented only after the driver reversed the vehicle.

The top BJP leaders and their supporters blocked the busy Dakbungalow roundabout for three hours. All of them courted arrest around 3.20pm.