In 2012, when former Supreme Court judge Markandey Katju stunned everyone at a seminar here by arguing that “there was no press freedom in Bihar”, only one person dared to oppose Katju who was then the chairman of the Press Council of India.
The person was Lalkeshwar Prasad Singh. He was then principal of the Patna College where the function took place in which Katju blamed Nitish for throttling media in his state. L P Singh’s opposition to Katju was obvious as the man, who became principal of Patna College, owed his elevation to the JD (U) strongman. His politician wife Usha Sinha was then the JD (U) MLA from Hilsa in Nitish Kumar’s home district Nalanda from 2010 to 2015.
Singh, who joined Patna University in 1978 as geography teacher, remained principal of Patna College from 2009 to 2013 before being appointed as chairman of the Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB) in 2014.
Call it coincidence or design, but it’s a fact that the BSEB earned bad name from 2014 itself when Shalini Rai, daughter of controversial principal of Vishun Roy College, Bachcha Rai, topped the matriculation examination. The trend continued in 2015 followed by 2016 intermediate results when the three toppers belonged to the same institute.