RJD chief Lalu Prasad's family skipped the inaugural function of Bihar Divas, creating ripples in political circles.

No family member was forthcoming on why they gave the event a miss, but RJD sources said Lalu was angry over his son and deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav name being omitted from the list of honoured guests in the invitation card. RJD legislators expressed disappointment over the way the single largest party in the state was being treated. "Tejashwi ji is no ordinary leader. He is the deputy chief minister. But his name was not there on the invitation card," RJD MLA Bhai Birendra said. "If our names are left out of invitation cards to social functions, we boycott it."

The invitation card circulated among lawmakers by the education department, the nodal agency looking after Bihar Divas, had just four names - chief minister Nitish Kumar, education minister Ashok Choudhary, Bihar education project council's state project director Sanjay Singh and education department principal secretary R.K. Mahajan. "His (Tejashwi's) name should have been there. He is the deputy chief minister and we are the largest party in the Grand Alliance," Birendra said. "The RJD, which has 80 MLAs, must get due respect."

"Lalu ji was very upset that his son's name was not in the list of honoured guests," said a senior RJD leader who was with Lalu at 10 Circular Road on Wednesday evening. "He asked Tejashwi not to attend the event. Laluji also said that sometimes Nitish forgets that he (read Lalu) too is part of the government."

Earlier, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi had come to attend Prakash Utsav in Patna on January 5, Lalu was excluded from the list of dignitaries. He and his two minister sons were not allowed to sit on the dais. "Tejashwi did the right thing," said a relative of Lalu who stays at 10 Circular Road. "Who knows, like Prakash Utsav, he may again have had to sit below the dais."

"It is disappointing that Tejashwi's name was not on the card," said Shakti Yadav, RJD MLA from Hilsa. "Nitish ji understands clearly how a government functions. I think such mistakes will not recur," Yadav said.

"I personally invited him and he had said yes," education minister Ashok Choudhary said. "There must be some personal reason."

But a JDU leader said on condition of anonymity: "When Tejashwi inaugurated the pontoon bridge at Vaishali, it was a government function but there was no poster of Nitishji .. only RJD posters. But we did not raise any objection. If something similar has taken place now, why is the RJD making so much noise?"

Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi backed Tejashwi. "When we were in power, the name and photograph of chief minister and deputy chief minister were prominently displayed at all government functions," Sushil said. "You can understand how the government is functioning when the chief minister's name and photo are missing from the deputy chief minister's programme and vice versa. I think Tejashwi was right in boycotting the programme."

Tejashwi refused to comment on the issue.