‘Dirty tricks from jail’: Sushil Modi tweets phone number, accuses Lalu of poaching

Bihar BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi has accused former chief minister Lalu Yadav of trying to poach MLAs of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in the state. Sharing a mobile number from which calls were purportedly made, Modi claimed that the jailed RJD leader was offering ministerial posts to the ruling coalition lawmakers.

“Lalu Yadav making telephone call (8051216302) from Ranchi to NDA MLAs & promising ministerial berths. When I telephoned, Lalu directly picked up.I said don’t do these dirty tricks from jail, you will not succeed,” Modi tweeted on Tuesday.

In the recently-concluded Assembly elections in Bihar the NDA returned to power in the state winning 125 of the 243 seats. The Mahagathbandhan, led by Lalu’s son Tejashwi, put up a brave fight winning 110 seats.

Modi, the former deputy CM of Bihar, also tweeted an audio clip doing the rounds past few days where a caller, purportedly Lalu, is heard asking an MLA to abstain from voting for the Speaker’s election due today. “Lalu has shown his true colours,” Modi captioned the clip. Opoyi could not verify the authenticity of the audio clip.

RJD chief Lalu Prasad is in Ranchi, where he has been sentenced by a special CBI court in a number of fodder scam cases. Initially lodged at the Hotwar Central Jail, he was moved to the RIMS hospital in the Jharkhand capital on medical grounds.

For the last few months, he has been putting up at the bungalow allotted to the Director of RIMS, which is seen as a favour extended to the ageing and ailing leader by the sympathetic Hemant Soren government in which the RJD is a partner.