Lalu has not just the MY but also Rajputs in his fold

While it is well known that Lalu Prasad's Rashtriya Janata Dal draws its strength from its core vote bank of Yadavs and Muslims, the party also gets the support of a large section of the powerful Rajput community. Even as RJD's rivals accuse Lalu of playing caste politics and indulging in minority appeasement, the former Bihar chief minister has very assiduously cultivated the Rajput community too.

In fact out of the four MPs that the party had in the outgoing 15th Lok Sabha, three were Rajputs with the fourth being Lalu himself before he was convicted and sent to jail in a fodder scam case resulting in his disqualification from Parliament. The party's three Rajput MP Prabhunath Singh from Maharajganj, Vaishali's Raghuvansh Prasad Singh and Jagadanand Singh from Buxar are leaving no stones unturned to ensure that the party bounces back with a vengeance in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections in Bihar.

Faced with a strong Bharatiya Janata Party and the development image of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, the RJD chief was forced to play his cards very carefully knowing fully well that if he fails to bag a large chunk of seats, his political survival would be at stake after having being mauled in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections and 2010 Bihar Assembly elections.

In the next two phases of polling in Bihar, Lalu's MY combine will also have a potent R (Rajput) factor with it making it an extremely formidable combination.

On May 7 voting will take place in Sheohar, Sitamarhi, Muzaffarpur, Maharajganj, Saran, Hajipur and Ujiarpur. The RJD won Saran and Maharajganj in the 2009 election with Lalu bagging the first by a margin of 51,815 and the late Uma Shanker Singh emerging as the winner in the second by a narrow margin of 2,797 votes. Incidentally Uma Shanker Singh had defeated Prabhunath Singh, who was with the Janata Dal United then.

Later Prabhunath Singh, a leader known for his strong arm tactics, later quit the JDU following differences with Nitish Kumar and joined the RJD. After Uma Shanker Singh's death on January 24, 2013, he was nominated to contest from Maharajganj against JDU candidate and Bihar Education Minister PK Shahi and Congress's Jitendra Swami, the son of Uma Shanker Singh.

But with the JDU-BJP alliance already on the verge of breakup, Prabhunath Singh trounced Shahi by a huge margin of over 1,37,000 votes. Singh's massive win was the result of the Muslim-Yadav vote bank combining with the Rajputs.

Now as the elections enter the home stretch, the same combination has ensured that a confident Lalu is eyeing many more seats riding on the Muslim-Yadav-Rajput combine.

RJD leaders in Saran, neighbouring Maharajganj, from where Lalu's wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi is facing a tough contest against BJP's Rajiv Pratap Rudy are confident that Prabhunath Singh's influence will ensure that a large number of Rajput votes go to the RJD. Even BJP workers admit that Rudy, himself a Rajput, does not have the hold over his community the way Singh has.

Similarly the much respected Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, who has won five consecutive elections from Vaishali, is one whom Lalu's trusts very much. The mild-mannered Raghuvansh Prasad Singh's popularity cuts across the caste and community barrier.

The RJD is hopeful that both Prabhunath Singh and Raghuvansh Prasad Singh along with Buxar MP Jagadanand Singh will ensure that Rajputs back RJD candidates in all 13 Bihar seats where voting will take place on May 7 and 12. With the MY combine aggressively behind Lalu, the Rajput votes gives the RJD a big edge over its rivals.