Tejashwi Yadav faces corruption charges, must not become leader of Opposition, says JD(U)

Patna: The ruling JD(U) in Bihar on Saturday demanded that RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav refrain from becoming the leader of the opposition since his name was involved in a number of corruption and criminal cases. The JD(U)’s demand came two days after party leader Mewa Lal Chaudhary resigned as the state’s education minister over a corruption taint. At a joint press conference here, JD(U)’s state president Vashishtha Narayan Singh, working president Ashok Choudhary and spokesmen Sanjay Singh, Neeraj Kumar and Ajay Alok slammed Yadav for having targeted Chief Minister Nitish Kumar over appointment of Mewa Lal Chaudhary as the education minister. Shortly after Mewa Lal Chaudhary resigned, Yadav had attacked the chief minister for inducting into his cabinet a “corrupt” person. Chaudhary has been named in an FIR lodged three years ago in connection with irregularities in recruitments at an agriculture university in Bhagalpur district while he was its Vice-Chancellor during 2010-15. The JD(U) leaders asserted that the resignation of Chaudhary, barely two days after he was allocated the portfolio, was in line with the chief minister’s “zero tolerance for crime, corruption, and communalism”. They said that unlike the clean record of the chief minister who is also the JD(U), Yadav carried the taint of a number of cases “lodged under various sections of the IPC and even SC/ST Act”. They pointed out that the state government has asked the superintendent of police of the district concerned to go ahead with the prosecution, which proved that Chaudhary, an MLA of the ruling party, was not being shielded. The governor’s nod is awaited in the matter. The JD(U) leaders alleged that while filing his nomination papers from Raghopur assembly seat, Yadav had not disclosed full details of cases in which he was named and urged the Election Commission to take note of the “deliberate omission”.