Patna: The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) on Monday expelled 27 leaders — including two MLAs — for anti-party activities and defying the organisation's ideology
in the Bihar assembly elections. The expelled leaders have also been suspended from the party's primary membership, said RJD state chief Mangani Lal Mandal in a statement. "The RJD took disciplinary action against the leaders after it found that they were indulging in anti-party activities against the RJD or Mahagathbandhan nominees", the statement said. The expelled MLAs are Chote Lal Rai (Parasa) and Mohammad Kamran (Govindpur). Four former legislators — Ram Prakash Mahto, Anil Sahni, Saroj Yadav and Anil Yadav — and ex-MLC Ganesh Bharti have also been suspended. Prominent leaders like Ritu Jaiswal, Akshay Lal Yadav, Ram Sakha Mahto, Avneesh Kumar, Bhagat Yadav, Mukesh Yadav, Sanjay Rai, Kumar Gaurav and Rajeev Kushwaha have also been expelled. Reacting to this, a senior RJD leader said, "The expelled leaders were working against the officially declared candidates of the INDIA bloc and RJD." The 243-member Bihar Assembly will go to polls in two phases on November 6 and 11, with results set to be announced on November 14. Meanwhile, Tejashwi Yadav, took to Facebook Live in the evening, urging migrants, who have come home for Chhath puja, to return from the state only after exercising their franchise. "I promise that by next Chhath, no one will need to move out of Bihar for a job, education, or treatment," he said. Tejashwi, who is the Opposition CM face, also targeted the railway minister for "a lot of troubles" faced by the migrants in boarding trains to reach their home for the festival and mocked the minister's claims of arranging 12,000 special trains. "Where are those trains? People of Bihar have been seen travelling in jam-packed trains and stuck in toilets. PM Modi & his govt should say sorry for this insult to Biharis," he said.
