Lalu Prasad is great at playing caste card: Former CBI man

KOLKATA: Playing the caste card comes naturally to former Bihar CM Lalu Prasad. Whether it is playing victim or invoking Baba saheb Ambedkar to manipulate investigation, Lalu has used casteism as a potent weapon, says Upen Biswas, former additional director of the CBI who headed the fodder scam investigation against Lalu. Biswas — an Ambedkarite and a Buddhist — is now the chairman of West Bengal SC and ST Development and Finance Corp and prominent face in Mamata Banerjee's government. The bureaucrat-turned-politician claims there was no way that Lalu could escape from the six cases of fodder scam, in two of which he has already been convicted.

Biswas dissected Lalu's comment made immediately after the conviction by the CBI court in Ranchi. The RJD chief equated himself with Ambedkar and Mandela. Four days ahead of his sentence, Biswas told ET that Lalu would make all efforts to earn sympathy using his caste card which he tried on investigators too.

"He can read and manipulate a person's psychology easily. He projects himself as the messiah of the backwards and now he invokes Ambedkar. But can anybody tell me, did he ever spearhead a movement to abolish the caste system? Babasaheb wanted to abolish caste system. Lalu survives on caste and he used his caste as an alibi to the huge corruption he indulged into over years. In his first interaction with me, he tried to get me at his side using my caste too," said Biswas.

"Lalu did not even build an Ambedkar memorial in his state. Moreover, Bihar figures prominently when it comes to the cases of atrocities on the people of backward classes. I know, he does this because caste feeds his brand of politics," added Biswas. "Fodder scam involves people from all castes including many Brahmins. His attempts to portray the scam as a conspiracy against lower caste people is not only political, but a calculated effort," he said.