OPINION

Supporters came in hordes, shouting ``Lalu Rabri zindabad''. RJD leaders, MLAs and Union ministers came with packets of sweets and bouquets. There were immediate telephone calls from PM Manmohan Singh and AICC president Sonia Gandhi, congratulating the RJD chief.

``I used to say I will get justice from the judiciary. I have been vindicated. My political opponents were giving judgments even before the court gave its verdict,'' Lalu said, specifically referring to deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi's reported statement in which he had said that Lalu would get seven-year imprisonment.

``Their (political opponents') face has been blackened. We have not made money through illegal means... The court has accepted this fact,'' Lalu said and recalled even the Income Tax Tribunal had accepted the returns filed by him and his wife. ``No, I have nothing to say against the CBI,'' he said.

Stating that he would take the verdict to the people, Lalu said the judgment will have a big impact on the country's politics.

Lalu's wife and former chief minister Rabri Devi too was relieved. She said, ``I was not only concerned about myself. I was concerned about my husband, my children and the party,'' she said. She conceded that there were tense moments for her and the family on Sunday. ``We did not know what would happen,'' she said.

The former chief minister admitted that the fodder scam had taken its toll on the party.

``The party's political fortunes took a beating due to the fodder scam,'' she said. Calling the DA case a ``politically motivated'', she said: ``The CBI did not make any fresh findings. They filed a case on the basis of the income-tax returns filed by us.''

Bihar CM Nitish Kumar, busy meeting people at `janata ka durbar' at his residence, could hear the sound of firecrackers bursting on the other side of the road. Almost everyone present there could make out railway minister Lalu Prasad and his wife have been acquitted in the DA case. For, Rabri's 10, Circular Road residence is situated on the other side of the road.

But Nitish was not in a mood to congratulate his political rival. Asked by newsmen, he paused, broadened his smile and quipped, ``Lalu has severed all relations with me.''

``Why should I react? I don't belong to a reactionary party!'' Nitish chuckled when prodded further. He said neither he nor the state government was a party to the case. ``Instead of me, the CBI should react because the case was between it and a Central minister,'' he added.

t is amazing news that Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav, quintessentially rustic politician and Minister for Indian Railways, will be a visiting Professor in Management Institution in India (IIMs). He is scheduled to give his lectures to management students at IIMA on September 18, 2006. Now, the management students will learn the crafty and manipulative skills of management from a political comedian who downgraded the economic and education system of Bihar for decades in his "Jungle Raj" for one and half decades. My first reaction to the above invitation by IIMs would be that how many times did they invite Dr. Man Mohan Singh, a role model for young Indians, and the main architect of Indian reforms and modern India, to deliver lectures to their students, when he was not the Prime Minister. Why did not they do that?
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"The deal will close all strategic options for the country," the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha told reporters after arriving at Orissa's Biju Patnaik airport here. "It may help the US but is not in India's interest."

Advani, who proceeded to Puri to attend a meeting of party functionaries, said the Parliament "should give a clear direction to the government in this sensitive matter."

On the issue of suspected infiltration by the Lashkar-e-Taiba in the country's armed forces, Advani said "it is a matter of grave concern for every nationalist. Such infiltration should be firmly dealt with."