Leaders of Bihar’s two ruling parties — the JD(U) and the BJP — are currently worried about the growing number of unseemly clashes witnessed at the meetings of their party workers across the state as they indicate that all is not well in the two parties’ affairs at the grassroots level just before the Assembly polls.
On Tuesday, senior leaders of both the parties saw unruly scenes created by their workers at separate meetings at Buxar and Madhepura as they went ahead with the vital pre-poll task of mobilising their local units. At the Buxar meeting of the BJP, party workers clashed among themselves and shouted slogans against the state leadership in presence of leaders like former minister Janardan Singh Sigriwal.
Coming a day after a BJP worker was ordered to be whisked away by the police for asking questions to deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi at his meeting at Lakhiserai, the Buxar incident heightened concerns among top BJP leaders in charge of the party’s election strategy. A meeting attended by top BJP leaders, including Ravi Shankar Prasad, at Paliganj on Saturday was marred by unruly behaviour of angry party workers.
Contrary to the BJP leaders’ expectations, the party’s Vikas Shivir workers’ meetings have witnessed unprecedented chaos.
and free-for-alls on at least five occasions last week.
At the JD(U)’s Madhepura workers’ meeting on Tuesday, chairs were hurled at the meeting venue by irate workers as the meeting was in progress in presence of senior leaders. Before this, the JD(U) has seen at least a dozen similar incidents at the meetings chaired by such stalwarts as party chief Sharad Yadav and chief minister Nitish Kumar over the past two weeks in Bihar.
“Such growing incidents remind us that our leadership has failed to inspire confidence and loyalty among our workers who are directly linked to the voters. We are working at finding ways to restore order fast because the Assembly polls are just three months away,” said a senior JD(U) leader close to Nitish Kumar.