Big setback for Sharad Yadav in fight against Nitish Kumar in Bihar, EC rejects claim on JDU party symbol

Yadav, the former president and co-founder of JDU, had approached the EC, claiming that he represented the “real” party. (Photo: PTI)

In a big setback to Sharad Yadav, the Election Commission on Tuesday rejected his claims made on the JD(U) poll symbol (arrow) and the offices allotted to the party, India Today TV reported. Yadav, the former president and co-founder of JDU, had approached the EC, claiming that he represented the “real” party, and that a majority of its national council members were with him. Yadav, who is locking horns with party chief Nitish Kumar, had approached EC after the party asked him to skip a recent Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) rally held in Patna and asserted that if he attended it, he would be working “against the party’s principles”. KC Tyagi had said that his participation would mean that he has quit the party voluntarily.

Earlier in the day, Rajya Sabha secretariat asked Yadav and Ali Anwar, another JDU MP, to respond within a week to their party’s petition that they be disqualified from the House for their “anti-party” activities, PTI reported. JD(U) had urged Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu to disqualify him and Ansari, after Yadav participated in a rally organised by the RJD. The party general secretary Sanjay Jha said there was precedence of a member being disqualified from the Rajya Sabha after they attended opposition’s events.

Jha cited the example of Jai Narain Prasad Nishad, a BJP member who had drifted toward the RJD. “We have given documentary and other evidence of both the leaders’ anti-party activities. That they have defied the party leadership and gone to the Election Commission seeking its symbol, is also an anti-party activity,” he said.