Bihar: Former RJD leader Lovely Anand joins JD(U)

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JD(U) on Monday claimed to have received a shot in the arm by inducting Lovely Anand, mother of turncoat RJD MLA Chetan Anand who had crossed over to the NDA during the assembly's budget session last month.

She joined the party, along with younger son Anshuman, at the JD(U)'s state headquarters here, amid speculations that a member of the family may be fielded by the JD(U) from the Sheohar Lok Sabha seat, which her husband Anand Mohan has represented twice.

The BJP has given up Sheohar for the JD(U) in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

Former JD(U) president Rajiv Ranjan Singh 'Lalan', in whose presence the mother-son duo joined the party, however, claimed he was not aware of the NDA's seat-sharing formula announced in Delhi.

''Whatever may be the case, it is going to be Nitish Kumar's call as to who will be the candidate from which seat. This is the way our party runs,'' he said.

Meanwhile, Kumar, also the JD(U) president, left for the national capital where he is expected to hold discussions with BJP's top leadership before candidates are announced by NDA partners for their respective seats.

Lovely Anand said joining the JD(U) felt like ''entering one's own house, giving up a rented accommodation'', even as she accused RJD of ''disrespect'' to her Rajput caste.

She made the allegation referring to RJD Rajya Sabha MP Manoj Jha's recital, inside the House, of 'Thakur Ka Kuan', a poem of Dalit writer Om Prakash Valmiki, which was much resented by the Rajputs, who are also called 'Thakur' in common parlance.

Lovely Anand started her political career in 1994 when she won the Vaishali Lok Sabha seat in a bypoll, defeating Kishori Sinha of the Congress, whose father had represented the constituency in the past and whose husband Satyendra Narayan Sinha was a former chief minister of Bihar.

A party hopper, Lovely Anand has since been associated with the now-extinct Bihar People's Party that her husband had floated, the Congress, the RJD and the Samajwadi Party.

Welcoming Lovely Anand into the JD(U), Lalan recalled her association with the party's previous avatar Samata Party, and expressed delight that ''after having lost her way, she is back with us''.

Lovely Anand's husband had last year walked out of jail after serving a life sentence in connection with the killing of G Krishnaiah, an IAS officer who was beaten to death by a mob in 1994.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)