CBI charges Rabri, NDA can’t hide its glee

PATNA, APRIL 4: Political crisis looms large once again over Bihar as the CBI today filed chargesheets in the disproportionate assets case...

PATNA, APRIL 4: Political crisis looms large once again over Bihar as the CBI today filed chargesheets in the disproportionate assets case against Chief Minister Rabri Devi and her husband RJD chief Laloo Prasad Yadav in the court of the special CBI judge S K Lal. The court took cognizance of the chargesheet but deferred issuing the arrest warrants.

The CBI has charged the couple with having assets disporportionate to their known sources of income. The case was filed in August 1998. The CBI has already interrogated the two and even searched the official residence of the Chief Minister.

But more than law it was politics which took centrestage today. Quick on its heels, the NDA leadership rushed to Raj Bhavan urgung Governor Vinod Chandra Pandey to “use his office” to get Chief Minister Rabri Devi to resign. “Since she is in office at the pleasure of the Governor, he should exercise his Constitutional prerogative to persuade her to resign,” said Nitish Kumar who had been sworn in by Pande only to step down once he was sure he didn’t have the numbers. The NDA has also called a Bihar bandh to mount pressure on the Government.

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NDA leaders also said that the Congress and the RJD had joined hands resolving to give a corruption-free government in the state and that now was an impossibility given that the Chief Minister herself was under a cloud.

A shaken Congress preferred not to commit itself today claiming that it would take some time to study the chargesheet and then react. The chargesheets are expected to trigger off a political battle in rural Bihar. Laloo himself said that this was a “political conspiracy” while the CPM said that today’s action smacked of vendetta. Senior RJD and CPM leaders cited the example of Union Ministers L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi who are still holding office despite being chargesheeted in the Babri Masjid demolition case.

Laloo ruled out Rabri’s resignation. “I’m determined to fight the conspiracy of the BJP and RSS. For me, this is a judicial and a political battle. There’s no question of the Chief Minister quitting as the Prime Minister himself has stated that a chargehseeted person need not resign from the Ministry.”

Laloo charged that “having failed to gain power,” the NDA leaders were now trying to capture it “through the backdoor.”

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One party that’s hopelessly caught in all this is the Congress. Already smarting over the allocation of ministries — it got a few politically “insignificant” portfolios while the top jobs went to the RJD — today party leaders looked sheepish and confused. Said Congress Minister Furkan Ansari: “We have apprised the high command of the situation and are awaiting their word.” He echoed Laloo’s line that there was nothing wrong in Rabri continuing as Chief Minister and that “secular forces” were being targeted by the communal ones. Therefore, there’s no question of any morality being involved in this, he said.

However, Nitish pointed out that even Laloo had stepped down following the chargesheet in the fodder scam case and therefore it was Rabri’s “constitutional obligation” to do the same.