Lalu Prasad Yadav addressing rally in Delhi.
Lalu Yadav, Nitish Kumar and Mulayam Singh Yadav targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi from one platform today in the first major protest organized by the group of political parties preparing to come together as the "Samajwadi Janata Dal".
Today, the leaders focused on black money and accused PM Modi of reneging on his election promise of bringing back crores in untaxed money stashed in foreign accounts.
"They keep saying tweet-tweet these days...I told my son Tejaswi to 'tweet' to Ramdev and ask about his promises on black money," Lalu Yadav, the chief of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, said, referring to the Yoga teacher's campaign supporting the BJP before the May election.
"We are waiting for black money to come back. We can wait a few more months. If you can't manage to bring it back by plane, we can arrange camels," he quipped.
Lalu Yadav repeatedly mocked PM Modi's catch phrase "Acche Din (good times)" and, referencing the row over religious conversions allegedly by groups linked to the ruling BJP's ideological mentor Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, alleged, "The Modi government is trying to divide the nation on religion."
Nitish Kumar replayed PM Modi's campaign speeches to demonstrate what he called double-speak by him and the BJP.
"He said if we got back the black money, each poor person would have up to 20 lakhs. Now he says he has no idea how much black money there is," Mr Kumar said.
The former Bihar chief minister said people were regretting voting for Mr Modi.
"Like we decided in two meetings to make one group, we have to pledge to offer a strong opposition and a strong alternative to the BJP," Mr Kumar said.
Mulayam Singh Yadav, the chief of the Samajwadi Party, had been tasked with working out the merger that brings socialist parties linked to the "Janata Parivar (family)" to become one big bloc against the ruling BJP-led coalition.
Mulayam Singh hosted the first meeting of the parties - a lunch last month attended by Nitish Kumar, Sharad Yadav, Lalu Yadav and former prime minister HD Deve Gowda. The leaders decided to work as a pressure or influence group in Parliament.