Ousted as party chief, Chirag expels rebel MPs
PATNA: The Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) appeared headed for split on Tuesday after a faction headed by Hajipur MP Pashupati Kumar Paras removed his estranged nephew Chirag Paswan as party chief, prompting Paswan’s loyalists to respond by stripping five rebel parliamentarians of the party’s primary membership.
The party, which has six MPs but no MLAs, plunged into a crisis late Sunday night after five lawmakers rebelled against Paswan’s leadership and chose Paras as the new leader of the parliamentary party. The MPs met Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla on Monday, and the Lok Sabha secretariat recognised Paras as the parliamentary party chief hours later.
On Tuesday, the Paras faction held an emergency meeting of the party national working committee at his residence. The leaders removed Paswan, who held the post since November 2019, as national president, and elevated senior vice-president Suraj Singh as working president. The meeting also decided to allow Singh to convene the party’s national council within five days to a new president. Party leaders said Paras was likely to be named the new LJP chief.
“Chirag lacks experience so we supported Paras. Chirag was unable to catch the pulse of Bihar’s politics and made a big mistake, for which he and the entire party had to bear the brunt. Our best wishes are with
Chirag Paswan… there is no rift in LJP,” said Khagaria MP Mehboob Ali Kaiser, one of the rebel lawmakers. He was referring to Paswan’s decision during the Bihar polls last year to fight alone and target the Janata Dal (United) despite being together in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).
Almost immediately, Paswan’s camp struck back. At a hurriedly called executive committee meeting held at Paswan’s house, all five rebel MPs were removed from the party.
A letter issued on the letterhead of Paswan and party general secretary Abdul Khaliq, and signed by Khaliq, said the five lawmakers – Paras, Kaiser, Samastipur MP Prince Raj, Vaishali MP Veena Devi, and Nawada MP Chandan Singh -- were stripped of the party’s primary membership with immediate effect.
“A national executive meeting was held in which leaders partic
ipated physically and through virtual mode and it was decided to remove all the five MPs from the party. There is a process of doing things in a party. This will be called a betrayal,” said LJP Bihar unit working chief Raju Tiwari.
Earlier in the day, Paswan, who represents Jamui in the Lok Sabha, tweeted an old letter written to Paras dated March 29, in which he urged his uncle to take the responsibility of keeping the party united.
“I attempted to keep together my family and this party founded by my father but I was unsuccessful. The party is like our mother and shouldn’t be betrayed,” tweeted Paswan, 38, in Hindi. His late father, former Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan, founded the party in 2000.
The family feud sparked dramatic scenes in the Capital on Monday after Paswan, who is recuperating from Covid, drove to Paras’s house but was made to wait outside for about 15 minutes. After failing to meet his uncle, Paswan left a letter that offered a compromise formula of making his mother Reena Paswan the party president.
The fight for control of the party is likely to move to the Election Commission for LJP’s bungalow poll symbol. Supporters of Paswan and Paras clashed at the party office in Patna.
Paswan assumed charge of LJP after his father died weeks before the Bihar elections last year. But relations between Paras and Paswan soured when LJP decided to contest against the BJP-JD(U) alliance and Paswan accused Kumar of misgovernance and corruption. During the campaign, Paras praised Kumar but was forced to retract his comment, which led to a bitter face-off between the two.
LJP took in many JD(U) rebels and damaged Kumar’s party in at least 30 seats, almost costing the NDA a victory, and resulting in the JD(U) posting its worst result in 15 years and emerging as a junior partner to the BJP. LJP also performed poorly, winning just one seat. In April, the lone party MLA, Raj Kumar Singh, joined the JD(U).
Paras’s praise of Kumar has triggered speculation of JD(U) backing the rebels. Before the rebellion on Sunday night, Paras met JD(U) MP Rajiv Ranjan Singh, a close aide of Kumar. Assembly deputy speaker Maheswar Hazari and MLC Sanjay Singh met the five LJP MPs on Monday.
Party leaders said that the LJP was headed for a split. “Now, it will break. LJP is going to witness a repeat of UP saga of Mulayam Singh Yadav-Akhilesh Yadav and Shivpal Yadav,” said DM Diwakar, former director of AN Sinha Institute of Social Studies, referring to a family feud in the Samajwadi Party ahead of the 2017 assembly polls in UP.