Leaving behind a fledgling acting career in Bollywood movies that hovered below his high expectations, Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan’s son Chirag on Tuesday made his formal entry into the choppy but promising waters of Bihar politics by being appointed chairman of the party’s parliamentary board.
The LJP, all but decimated in recent elections and now struggling hard to boost its prospects in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, announced the decision at its national executive in New Delhi, marking the second instance in two months of a Bihar political scion joining the family vocation.
In May, Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav had launched his two sons — former IPL cricketer Tejashwi and businessman-student Tej Pratap — in politics at a major rally of the party in Patna’s Gandhi Maidan. But unlike the LJP chief, Mr Yadav did not anoint his sons to any important party post.
The junior Paswan, a BTech graduate from Amity University, Delhi, said after his appointment that he would do his best to strengthen the party organisation in Bihar.
His father, a former five-time Union minister and currently a Rajya Sabha member, said Chirag will be the party’s “star campaigner” and play an important role by setting up poll management committees in the states.
“My film career has taken a backseat and I want to concentrate more on politics. I had joined the film world to create an identity for myself, but I feel I failed to prove myself there,” said a down-to-earth Chirag in a recent interview.