Rustic and charismatic leader Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) is in for a makeover.

If everything goes well, you may not see the party workers sporting a green gamchha (thin towel) around their necks or swirling it over their heads (to express power and delinquency), or jostling for selfies with their favourite leader from the next week. They would sport green caps and badges instead and move or sit in an orderly manner instead of milling around in a mob.

The RJD top brass has issued detailed instructions for the party workers and leaders in this regard with directions to start implementing them with Tejashwi Prasad Yadav’s statewide Karyakarta Samvad Karyakram (dialogue with party workers), which begins on September 10 from Samsatipur and will continue till September 17.

The programme is being widely seen as a preparatory for next year’s Assembly election.

The intention is to infuse discipline in the RJD rank and file, as well as, get rid of the stamp of hooliganism that has been haunting the party for the past three decades.

Sources said that the makeover is Tejashwi’s brainchild, who wants the RJD to keep pace with the changing times and do away with the image of the party that identifies it with lathi (stick), gamchha, muretha (gamchha used as a headgear), and hooliganism.

A copy of the instructions that is with The Telegraph reveals that the workers and leaders have been asked to “give preference to green cap and badge instead of green gamchha” and not to break discipline to click selfies and photographs.

They have also been asked not to share confidential directions and information about important meetings on social media platforms.

The instructions have been sent to everybody in the party right from the panchayat presidents to block and district presidents.

Learning a lesson from the way Tejashwi was mobbed while campaigning during
the Lok Sabha election earlier this year, which at times threw his schedule haywire, and also posed a security threat, the RJD has now ordered that only those office bearers and workers approved, who have been given prior approval by the party, would be present at his coming programme.

“Do not bring an unwanted crowd to the programme because the leader of the Opposition (Tejashwi) will interact only with the invited party workers. He will meet other party workers, well-wishers and prominent persons at the circuit house in a serial and orderly manner.

“Everybody is expected to follow discipline. The honourable leader always appreciates people who follow discipline,” the instructions issued by Bihar RJD president Jagadanand Singh said.

The party has also decided to stop the unnecessary use of decorative gates, hoardings, posters and loudspeakers.

Instructions have also asked the party workers not to discuss anybody’s candidature for the 2025 Assembly elections, but focus on strengthening the organisation.