Guru present, pupils absent

Tej Pratap and Tejaswi rarely share the stage with Nitish Kumar at public events. The Lalu sons were also conspicuously absent from the chief minister's recent janata durbar. When a journalist asked Nitish about the missing brothers, the chief minister retorted: "I am present and that is enough."

The brothers have not been seen in Nitish's presence ever since the "fiasco" during the inauguration of the kidney ward of IGIMS when health minister Tej Pratap was suddenly declared ill and the chief minister was reported to be "too busy" to attend. Earlier, there was a joke about Nitish being the new political guru of Lalu's sons. "But the relationship between the guru and his pupils appears to have taken a beating," quipped a BJP leader.

That meddling feeling

RJD chief Lalu Prasad's sudden interest in electrification of the riverine areas of Patna and Saran has set tongues wagging in political circles. "It is quite understandable that Lalu ji wants to take credit for the electrification of the riverine areas of these two Lok Sabha seats because in 2019 both his daughter Misa Bharti and his wife Rabri Devi would be contesting again from Patliputra and Saran respectively," remarked an official. "But Laluji called a meeting of power department officials and gave his orders. We cannot have two centres of power. The power department is headed by a senior JDU minister Bijendra Prasad Yadav." But even opposition parties and officials appear to have accepted that there are two centres of power, he added.

Durbar details

Now that the government indents to open grievance redress cells in all the districts, there were speculations that the chief minister's janata durbar may be discontinued. On Monday, however, Nitish Kumar stressed that the durbar will continue along with grievance redress cells. "It will be interesting," said a JDU leader. "If the number of people appearing in the durbar remains unchanged it would mean the cells are not doing their job." A JDU minister chipped in: "Politically also it is the one chance in a week the CM gets to interact with people rather than through legislators. And if Sushil Kumar Modi can continue his janata durbar, why should the CM stop it?"