Rahul, Sharad Yadav meet, spark off Rajya Sabha speculation

A sudden meeting between Rahul Gandhi and RJD leader Sharad Yadav sparked off speculation over the political future of the veteran given that 5 Rajya Sabha seats are falling vacant from Bihar in July. Out of the five Rajya Sabha seats falling vacant from Bihar on July 7, the BJP will get 2, JD-U 1, and RJD 2, based on their numbers in the Assembly.

New Delhi: A sudden meeting between Rahul Gandhi and RJD leader Sharad Yadav sparked off speculation over the political future of the veteran given that 5 Rajya Sabha seats are falling vacant from Bihar in July. Out of the five Rajya Sabha seats falling vacant from Bihar on July 7, the BJP will get 2, JD-U 1, and RJD 2, based on their numbers in the Assembly.

The Congress has just 19 MLAs and is not in a position to get its nominee elected. The term of Sharad Yadav, who had been elected to the Rajya Sabha in 2017, too will end on July 7 though he had been disqualified earlier.

Significantly, Sharad Yadav, who founded the Loktantrik Janata Dal in 2018, had merged his outfit with Lalu Prasad Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in March. Before that, RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav had visited Sharad Yadav to seek his blessings. Sources said an understanding may have been reached between the Congress and the RJD to resend Sharad Yadav to the upper house as a nominee of the grand old party, which will need the support of RJD lawmakers.

As per the sources, if the RJD supports the candidature of Sharad Yadav, Congress can support Lalu Prasad’s party in the coming Bihar Legislative Council elections. The presence of Sharad Yadav, an OBC leader who has worked for the rights of the poor and backward all his life, would add weight to Congress’s attempts to regain the crucial vote bank.

Interestingly, after meeting Rahul, Sharad Yadav said he should be Congress chief and pointed out that the grand old party needed to win back the confidence of the backward and the poor, as they had been its traditional supporters.

In turn, Rahul termed Yadav as his guru. The sources further said that though the presence of Sharad, 75, in the Rajya Sabha will send a strong message, given his health condition, his daughter Subhashini may also be sent to the upper house as a Congress nominee.

Subhashini had contested the 2020 Bihar assembly polls from the Bihariganj seat in Madhepura district as a Congress candidate. She lost the polls but Rahul had termed her as his sister then.

The sources further said that though Subhashini lacked the experience of her father, she is young and her representation of the Congress will save the grand old party the bother of opting for a politician who spoke against the grand old party for the most part of his life.

“This is a decision to be made by Sharad ji himself or the Congress leadership,” a senior Congress leader said on condition of anonymity.

Sharad Yadav, who had been elected to the upper house in 2017 as a JD-U nominee was later disqualified after he developed serious differences with Bihar chief minister and JD-U chief Nitish Kumar over realigning with the BJP. Way back in 1997, differences between Lalu Prasad and Sharad Yadav had led the former to party ways with the then Janata Dal and form his own RJD.

After being disqualified from the Rajya Sabha, Sharad Yadav moved the top court against an earlier order of the Delhi High Court, which had asked him to vacate the government bungalow within 15 days. The top court recently asked him to vacate the official bungalow allotted to him by May 31 although the leader had sought time till July.

Yadav, 75, had urged the court that his case "deserved sympathetic treatment" on account of his ill health. Appearing for him, Congress leader and senior advocate Kapil Sibal had argued that Yadav’s term was ending in July and that he was willing to vacate the bungalow by then.

"This man has to undergo dialysis every other day. He was on a ventilator during Covid time and is suffering from various ailments. I am not saying I will not vacate the bungalow but give me some reasonable time," Sibal had told the court.