Emergency produced leaders like me: Lalu

Varanasi, Apr 25: Justifying the imposition of emergency in 1975, Railway Minister and RJD chief Lalu Prasad today said ''it was necessary for curbing indiscipline in the country and creating national leaders like me.'' ''Oos samay desh mein karai ki zaroorat thi is liye emergency lagayi gayi'' (imposition of emergency was essential to curb indiscipline in the country at that time), Mr Prasad said while addressing a press conference here. ''Indiscipline like recent utterances by Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackarey against President A P J Abdul Kalam can be curbed through emergency only,'' he added.

Asked if emergency could be imposed again in future, he said ''dubara emergency ki zaroorat paregi to kyo nahi hoga'' (if need arose emergency could be imposed again).

Adding in the same vein, Mr Prasad said if emergency had not have been imposed he could not have become a leader. ''Agar Emergency nahi hoti to hum neta bante kya.'' Mr Prasad, who was jailed during the emergency dropped another bombshell by saying he was the author of the complete revolution which is generally credited to Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan.

''Uske Main Admi hum thay... mai us samay student union ka president thaa aur maine hi baad main J P ko woh naujawano ka movement de diya thaa'' (It was me not J P who authored that movement of youths. As the president of student union I handed over the movement to J P later), Mr Prasad claimed.

Elaborating his justification of emergency further, Mr Prasad said ''emergency has produced many leaders including me who are presently ruling the roost. Even those presently ruling Bihar were born out of emergency.'' ''Aaj jo log Bihar chala rahein hai woh bhi usi emergenciye se nikle hain,'' he remarked.

The former Bihar Chief Minister, however, slammed the present occupant of the post, Mr Nitish Kumar. ''He is an accidental Chief Minister of Bihar.... who has not been able to expand his cabinet even once during his nearly one-and- a-half year tenure,'' Mr Prasad said. Mr Prasad also said the days of the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar are numbered.

He criticised the Bihar government for failing to prevent the growing kidnapping of children. ''When our government was there children were abducted but returned home safely, but now the little ones who are abducted are found killed on the railway tracks in the same state.'' ''Hum logon ke samay to bacchey choot jaate thay...par ab to woh mare huye milte hai.'' About the political furore over recent statements by young Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Mr Prasad said his utterances were unnecessarily twisted to tarnish his dynamic image.

Defending Mr Gandhi for his Bangladesh creation statement, the RJD leader said ''India has always helped those with whom injustice has been done and hence the entire country helped in the creation of Bangladesh in 1971. But whoever headed the government in the country that time will obviously get the credit for successfully spearheading the cause.''

UNI