Patna: RJD chief Lalu Prasad's wife and former chief minister Rabri Devi will celebrate Chhath, the state's signature festival, this year after skipping it last year because of her health.

"Yes, Chhath will be celebrated this year," Lalu said on Wednesday when asked if his family would celebrate on October 26, when the four-day festival begins this year.

Chhath at 10 Circular Road, Lalu's Patna address, has always been a grand affair. Rabri started celebrating the festival when her eldest daughter Misa Bharti was five years old, more than three decades ago.

She had even celebrated the festival when Lalu was in jail for the fodder scam in 2013.

The only two years she did not celebrate were in 2014, when Lalu was ill, and last year when her knee problem acted up.

From 2009 to 2012 she celebrated the festival at New Delhi's 25 Tughlaq Road, the house Lalu was allotted as an MP.

In 2015, Chhath at 10 Circular Road was an especially elaborate affair, bathed in the glow of the RJD emerging as the single largest party in the Assembly elections and both of Rabri's sons becoming ministers in their debut electoral outing.

Asked if there was any special reason for celebrating Chhath this year, Abha Lata, a close confidante of Rabri who spends most of her time at 10 Circular Road, said: "There is no special reason. Last year she was not well and this year she is perfectly fine, that's why she is celebrating Chhath."

Other sources close to the family, however, said with Lalu, his younger son Tejashwi Yadav and eldest daughter Misa having been grilled by central agencies over corruption cases had lent special urgency to appeasing the gods to steer the family out of troubled waters.

"The whole of Bihar knows very well that Lalu ji and his family are innocent and they have been wrongly targeted by the central investigative agencies on the instructions of Narendra Modi and Amit Shah," said Abha Lata, who is also the state president of the RJD's women's wing.

"By doing Chhath, Rabri Devi will get the blessing from Chhathi Maiya and her family will come out clean from all the problems."

Rabri used to offer arghya (obeisance) in the swimming pool at 10 Circular Road - built in 2005 when the family had shifted from 1 Aney Marg - instead of the riverbank.

In 2014, the pool was filled up with soil because its position was deemed inauspicious. Another swimming pool has since been built in the northeast corner of the house.