Bihar Assembly election 2020: Ex-Union minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh quits RJD

Patna: In a setback to Bihar’s main Opposition RJD ahead of the state Assembly polls, its national vice president and former Union minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh resigned from the party on Thursday, sources close to him said. In a letter to jailed RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav, the veteran leader wrote he was quitting the party. “Since the death of Jannayak Karpoori Thakur, I stood behind you for 32 years, but not now,” he wrote in his brief one-line resignation letter to Yadav, who is serving sentences in four fodder scam cases in Ranchi. In the footnote, he added, “I got the affection of party leaders and workers, besides common people. Please forgive me.” Thakur was a prominent socialist leader and former state chief minister. Singh, admitted to AIIMS, New Delhi, because of post-COVID complications, had earlier announced his resignation in June but was persuaded by Yadav to stay back. Singh, who held several portfolios in the Manmohan Singh government, including that of rural development, was reportedly unhappy over the proposed induction of alleged mafia don and former Lok Janshakti Party MP from Vaishali Rama Singh into the RJD. He was also not happy with the style of functioning of Yadav’s heir apparent and Leader of the Opposition in the Bihar assembly Tejashwi Yadav, party sources said.