Patna: Protests against the Waqf Bill rocked the Bihar capital on Wednesday, as Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav vowed to fight it out till rollback of the “undemocratic” legislation by the NDA government at the Centre. Yadav drove down to Gardanibagh, the designated spot for 'dharnas' in the city, along with ailing father Lalu Prasad, the RJD president, to express solidarity with a demonstration staged by the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB). Barely a kilometre away, RJD MLAs and their Left allies, who had reached the assembly carrying the tricolour and placards with slogans denouncing the contentious Bill, stalled the proceedings of the assembly, forcing adjournment till 2 pm.
Yadav told the AIMPLB gathering that “we believe in your cause and our party had expressed the same before the Joint Parliamentary Committee when it came to Bihar. We will fight it out till this ‘Nagpuriya’ undemocratic and unconstitutional legislation is rolled back”. The allusion was to the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the parent body of the ruling BJP at the Centre. The AIMPLB had recently announced plans to hold protests in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh, primarily to goad chief ministers of the two states, Nitish Kumar and Chandrababu Naidu, respectively, both of whom swear by their “secular” credentials. Indirectly targeting Kumar, Yadav said “there are some who are supporting the Bill because of their greed for power… I am proud that I have in my veins the blood of Lalu ji, who has come here despite his body having been worn down by a kidney transplant and heart surgeries”. Notably, Lalu Prasad remains a favourite with the minority community on account of his gutsy arrest of BJP patriarch L K Advani in the thick of the Ayodhya movement in the 1990s, as well as his ability to keep Bihar relatively free of communal clashes.
Yadav told the gathering that “we had moved an adjournment motion before the assembly on the Waqf issue. The proceedings could not continue long enough for a discussion to take place”..“We will blow to smithereens the agenda of this government, which is dictatorial and wants to throw the Constitution out of the window. Today, in the name of regulating the Waqf, they are targeting Muslims. Tomorrow, it may be the turn of Christians and Sikhs,” he asserted. After the RJD leaders left the site of the day-long dharna, the protesters were joined by Jan Suraaj Party founder Prashant Kishor, who has promised to field a significant number of Muslims in the Bihar assembly polls due later this year.