NEWS

As Chirag Paswan began his “Aashirvaad Yatra” from Hajipur, back in state capital Patna there were further signs of the seemingly growing bonhomie between the embattled leader and RJD, which commemorated the life of Ram Vilas Paswan on his birth anniversary at a programme to mark the 25th foundation day of RJD.

The party began the day with Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav garlanding the photograph on Paswan. The RJD leader tweeted, “Many respects to Shri Ram Vilas Paswan ji, senior socialist leader and former Union Minister who struggled throughout his life for the marginalised, disenfranchised and the poor.”

In a major relief, Punjab recorded its lowest Covid death toll Sunday since the second wave in March this year. The state recorded just five Covid deaths and 158 fresh cases in the past 24 hours, as per the state bulletin.

Grappling with the highest case fatality rate (CFR) in the country, the single-digit death count comes as a breather for Punjab, which otherwise recorded more than a hundred deaths each day from April 27 to May 31 during the peak of second wave. The highest toll of 231 deaths in a day was witnessed on May 18. However, Punjab's overall CFR still stands at 2.70%, the highest in the country.

Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi are back on RJD posters in Bihar, along with Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, on the eve of the party’s silver jubilee function on Monday. However, Lalu’s elder son Tej Pratap and daughter Misa Bharti were missing from the main poster outside the party headquarters.

Though a separate poster of Tejashwi and Tej Pratap was put up in the evening, Misa did not feature on it. Tej Pratap was conspicuous by his absence on the first day of the two-day silver jubilee celebrations of the RJD foundation day that began at the party office on Sunday. During the 2020 Bihar Assembly elections, RJD chief Lalu was nowhere on official party posters and Tejashwi, who held fort alone, faced criticism from the JD(U) and BJP for “ignoring his parents for votes.”

Not satisfied with the performance of the known leaders, the BJP top brass was left with limited options and took a major gamble by nominating a lesser known second-time MLA Pushkar Singh Dhami as Uttarakhand CM.

The decision, in what is seen as a generation shift, is also an attempt to spur the party cadre ahead of the state election.

Other than belonging to the Rajput community, which constitutes over 32% of the state population, Dhami’s long term organisational experience and rapport with party cadres came handy for him. Successive wins from Khatima in Kumaon region counted as a factor as the region is considered a stronghold of Congress veteran and former CM Harish Rawat.