In an unusual turn of events, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav’s older sibling Tej Pratap Yadav has claimed that the BJP-RSS had hacked his Facebook account in order to create a rift within the family and hurt the party. Tej Pratap’s clarification came about an hour after a post appearing on his Facebook page appeared to indicate that he was miffed with some RJD leaders.

The now-deleted post also hinted that his parents – RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav and Rabri Devi – were not taking his complaints seriously. Tej Pratap, a former Bihar minister, later claimed that his “hacked” account had been recovered with Facebook’s help. “BJP supporters have always tried to hack my social media accounts and today they succeeded," he said in a post on Monday night.

Monday night’s Facebook fiasco comes weeks after Tejashwi and Tej Pratap tried to project a united face by cutting the cake together on the occasion of their father’s birthday celebration. 

Patna: Tej P Yadav shows'No Entry Nitish Chacha'poster at his mother's residence for Bihar CM Nitish Kumar,says,"My Facebook account was hacked by BJP-RSS. Because of my increasing popularity Nitish Chacha &Sushil Modi Chacha got my social media profiles hacked,will file an FIR." pic.twitter.com/627iUW3f1a

— ANI (@ANI) July 3, 2018

With the RJD supremo and former chief minister Lalu Yadav serving a jail sentence, Tejashwi, 28, appears to have unofficially taken over the mantle of the RJD chief and gets most of the media attention, even nationally.

Reports of a rift started doing the rounds when 29-year-old Tej Pratap in a  mysterious tweet said he wanted to get “Arjuna seated on the throne of Hastinapur and himself return to Dwarka”.

This mythological reference was taken by some observers as proof that Tej Pratap was unhappy with his position within the party. The cake-cutting function was an attempt to put an end to such rumours. 

Tej Pratap also sought to link the alleged “hacking” of his Facebook account to Bihar Chief Minister and JD(S) chief Nitish Kumar, who parted ways with the RJD and Congress and joined hands with the BJP last year.