Hundreds of Congress activists and a section of lawyers owing allegiance to the party on Tuesday demonstrated in Patna demanding that RJD chief Lalu Prasad be kept out from the union cabinet.

The partymen and lawyers assembled at Kargil Chowk near Gandhi Maidan and shouted anti-Lalu and anti-RJD slogans.

They urged UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and prime minister Manmohan Singh to keep the RJD leader out of the union cabinet.

Meanwhile, state Congress president Anil Sharma said he had apprised Sonia Gandhi of the prevailing mood of Congressmen and urged her not to include Lalu in the UPA government in the 'larger interest' of the party in Bihar.

�The exclusion of Lalu from the union cabinet would send wrong signals and hasten the return of minorities, upper castes, ebcs and dalits back into the partyfold,� Sharma said.