Leaders of Grand Alliance and Left parties hold 'Aakrosh March' in Patna, Tejashwi skips united show

PATNA: Leaders of the five-party opposition’s Grand Alliance (GA) along with the Left parties on Wednesday took out ‘Aakrosh March’ in the state capital as well as in the district headquarters across Bihar to register their protest against “anti-people” policies of both central and the state governments.

It was the first united show of the GA and Left parties in Bihar after their humiliating defeat in the last Lok Sabha polls held in May 2019. Out of 40 Lok Sabha seats in the state, the opposition (Congress) won only one Kishanganj seat.

Though senior most leaders of the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP), the Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular (HAM-S), Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) and state level leaders of the Congress, CPI and CP(M) participated in the march, RJD senior and leader of oppostion in Bihar Assembly did not turn up to join the united show.

Lalu Prasad’s party was, however, represented by its spokesperson Mrityunjay Tiwari. The RJD MLA Ramanuj Prasad joined the march when it was near to reach the office of Patna DM.

Earlier, senior GA leaders like RLSP chief and former Union minister Upendra Kushwaha, HAM-S chief and former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi, the VIP chief Mukesh Sahni, state Congress president and former minister Madan Mohan Jha, CPI state secretary Satya Narayan Singh and state level leaders of CP(M) took out the protest march from Gandhi maidan and marched up to near the office of Patna DM.

The Opposition leaders, however, could not hand over their memorandum to the DM Kumar Ravi as he was not present in the office and a junior officer was deputed to receive the memorandum.

“As the DM was not present to receive the memorandum despite prior information given to him, we decided not to hand over it to a junior officer,” RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha said. He also alleged that the DM was absent at the instruction of top leaders of ruling NDA.

Kushwaha, who played a lead role in bringing all GA and Left parties under one banner, had on Tuesday claimed that all prominent leaders of the GA and Left would participate in the March. But neither Tejashwi nor any other prominent figure of the RJD participated.

On being asked as to why Tejashwi Yadav not joined in the march, Tiwari said he could not participate in the united show because of his prior engagement with his legal matters as well as ensuing assembly polls in Jharkhand. “RJD’s state president Ram Chandra Purbey could not joint the march because he is busy in activities related to the party's ongoing organisational election,” Tiwari said.

Accroding to reports from different district headquarters, the GA and Left leaders took out similar joint ‘Aakrosh March’ in most of the district towns across the state and submitted their memorandum to the respective DMs.