2 former CMs, polls apart, celebrate b’day
Birthday of two former Jharkhand chief ministers, Shibu Soren and Babulal Marandi, was celebrated on Monday with the former cutting a 77 pound birthday cake on his 77th birthday.
Meanwhile, Marandi welcomed his well-wishers who turned up at his residence to greet him on his 63rd birthday.
The two prominent leaders of Jharkhand share the birthday on January 11.
The political adversaries also took on each other on a number of occasions from Dumka Lok Sabha seat. Soren had defeated Marandi in 1991 and 1996. The latter had won in 1998 and 1999 defeating Soren, an eight-time MP from Dumka. At present, Soren is a Rajya Sabha MP.
On Monday, Shibu Soren was seen spending time with his family members and old friends at his Morabadi-based Ranchi residence. The Jharkhand chief minister and his son Hemant Soren turned up around 11.30am to greet his father.
Water resources minister Mithilesh Kumar, labour minister Satyanand Bhokta, tribal welfare and transport minister Champai Soren, apart from a large section of JMM leaders and party workers, were also present at the occasion.
Later, Hemant released three books written by Anuj Kumar on the JMM supremo.
While one book is written in Hindi and titled Dishom Guru: Shibu Soren, the other one is written in English and titled Tribal hero: Shibu Soren. The third one is a children’s book and contains pictorial depictions of the tribal leader and is titled Suno bachhon: Adivasi sangharsh ke nayak, Shibu Soren.
Jharkhand Pradesh Congress president Rameshwar Oraon, Congress legislature party leader Alamgir Alam, health minister Banna Gupta, agriculture minister Badal Patralekh and other prominent leaders were also present.