The railway largesse spills on Bihar again

Mail Today reports :-

Lalu Prasad made no bones about where his heart is — barely a couple of days after reminding the Thackerays that Maharashtra is as much for the Biharis as for the Marathis.In his fifth successive Railway Budget, he pulled out a set of 15 gravy trains for his home state. Probably with the elections in mind, so as not to forget that Lalu the railway minister is also the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief and an elected representative for Chapra Lok Sabha seat in his native Bihar. The largesse includes one train linking his village with that of wife Rabi Devi’s.The list does not end there. Lalu gifted his home state a new power plant, wagon reconstruction unit, modernisation of workshop and takeover of wagon factories located in Bihar. All these and more in gratitude for Bihar, from which he draws his strength of 24 MPs.When he announced the names of 63 new trains, including 10 “garib raths”, the Opposition was up on their feet as the Bihar connection became apparent.Since the RJD was ousted from power in Bihar in 2005, Lalu has been making effective use of his ministry by announcing a slew of railway projects for Bihar in an apparent bid to win back the support of the electorate. This year’s budget is no exception.

By introducing several new trains such as Delhi-Jaynagar Garib Rath, Amritsar-Saharsa Express, Muzaffarpur-Surat Express via Chapra, Saharsa-Jaynagar Express, Delhi-Jogbani Express, Kamakhya-Gaya Express, Mathura-Chapra Express, Puri-Darbhanga Express, Vasco da Gama-Patna Express, Gaya-Chennai Express, Ranchi-Bhagalpur Express, Patna Sahib-Anand Sahib Special and above all, the Phulwaria-Hajipur passenger, he has almost covered the entire state to make sure
that he does not disappoint the voters in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections.

He was merely following the tradition of his predecessors from Bihar in the railway ministry, who had nurtured their constituencies quite meticulously during their respective tenures.Chief minister Nitish Kumar, who was railway minister twice in 1998-99 and 2001-04, and LJP president Ram Vilas Paswan who held the same position in 1996-98 had taken extra care to shower the railways’ largesse on the state.In fact, Bihar has had the advantage of having a railway minister for the 11 of the past 12 years. Except for a brief term of Trinamul Congress leader Mamata Bannerjee in 2000, it is the redoubtable Lalu-Nitish-Paswan trio that has brought the gravy trains to the state.

Before the trio, Bihar had Jagjivan Ram (1956-62), L.N. Mishra (1973-75) and Kedar Pandey (1980-81). Besides, George Fernandes, who represented Bihar in the Lok Sabha, had also held the railway portfolio in 1989-90.