Lalu Prasad

Patna, April 30: When Lalu Prasad engages in friendly banter with Sonia Gandhi at the wedding reception of his daughter, it gives Congressmen something to chew on.

Last Tuesday (April 24), as Sonia reached the 25 Tughlak Marg residence of Lalu Prasad, the RJD boss greeted her with pleasantries and ready wit. “Madam,” sources present at the venue quoted Lalu Prasad as exclaiming, “Anushka (his daughter) too is going to the Congress family.”

At which, the usually reserved Sonia too was learnt to have guffawed: “The Congress also likes you.” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was with the two, was seen smiling.

Lalu Prasad, the father of the bride, was making a reference to Anushka’s marriage into a Congress family — the groom Chiranjeev Rao is the son of Haryana power minister Ajay Singh Yadav. Chiranjeev is himself the president of the Haryana Youth Congress.

Sources present at the reception say the bonhomie between the RJD chief and the Congress president was reminiscent of the old times when Lalu Prasad was a loyal ally in the UPA-I government. The RJD’s electoral drubbing in the 2009 elections, when it saw its strength in the Lok Sabha dwindle from 24 to four, and subsequently in the 2010 Assembly polls, which it fought independently of the Congress, ushered in a period of political hibernation for Lalu Prasad.

But some Congress leaders are seeing a thawing of the chill that set in since the 2009 defeat and are now suggesting that the “alienation” of Lalu is over.

“The party (Congress) is seriously considering accommodating Lalu Prasad in the Union cabinet besides bridging the gap with Ram Vilas Paswan — a Dalit leader and as well as Lalu’s ally,” a senior Congress leader told The Telegraph on condition of anonymity.

The leader pointed out several instances in the recent past when Lalu Prasad has sided with the Congress. He supported the government during the controversy over Anna Hazare and the Lokpal bill and has even rooted for Vice-President Hamid Ansari as the presidential choice. Today, Lalu extended support to the Congress candidate in the Jharkhand Rajya Sabha polls, Pradip Balmuchu.

“It was not for nothing that Lalu lobbed Hamid Ansari’s name as the presidential candidate. He (Lalu) did it at the behest of top Congress strategists. Sonia Gandhi is said to be personally happy at Lalu lobbing a Congressman’s name at a time when even some Congress allies, including Sharad Pawar and Mamata Banerjee, are believed to be working against the Congress’s wish on the presidential candidate.”

Bihar Congress grapevine has it that the party was in the process of changing its strategy in the state after its poor show in Uttar Pradesh. After the break-up of the Congress-RJD-LJP alliance, Sonia’s outfit decided against any truck with Lalu on the ground that it wished to “strengthen” its “organisation” at the grassroots-level. Rahul Gandhi gave a call for “go it alone” in successive polls after 2009 with party strategists openly flaunting the theory that the alliance with Lalu had weakened the Congress beyond redemption in Bihar.

“However, the setback in UP has changed it all. Our immediate target is to win more MPs in the 2014 elections. We cannot do it unless we align with some formidable regional forces,” said another Congress leader. “It is a fact that Lalu, despite his setbacks in 2009 and 2010, is the strongest force against the NDA in Bihar. It was the RJD which gave a realistic fight to the JD(U) in the byelections at Doranda and Lokaha seats last year with the party even registering a rise in its vote-share at both places.”

The Congress has just two members in the current Lok Sabha from Bihar, one of them being Speaker Meira Kumar.

However, state Congress leaders are aware that it is 10 Janpath which will take the final call. Also, they pointed out, any move to rehabilitate Lalu Prasad will need the endorsement of Rahul Gandhi, who is said to be still averse to an alliance with the Bihar leader.

The state Congress is also keeping a “watch” on the widening rift between the JD(U) and the BJP.

“We will have to work out our strategy afresh in the event of the BJP-JD(U) alliance breaking,” said Bihar Pradesh Congress committee president Mehboob Ali Quaiser, who has been leading a “pol khol yatra (expose march)” against the “loot” of the public exchequer during the Nitish Kumar rule.