In an apparent reference to Congress with which it failed to strike an understanding for assembly polls in Jharkhand, RJD chief Lalu Prasad has said national parties are out to "crush" smaller and regional outfits.

"National parties want relentlessly to crush smaller and regional parties. They want to virtually eat them up in Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra," he said.

But, leaders like Mulayam Singh Yadav of SP, Sharad Pawar of NCP and Mayawati of BSP, besides him, will not get marginalised by "such nefarious designs", Prasad said at the RJD national executive meeting here yesterday.

The RJD chief rued that the Centre listened to only those who commanded power and were with it. "You see whether it was Mahabharata, Mughal period or any other era, Delhi heard only the people with lathi (power)," he said.

Attacking the Centre, the former railway minister said the UPA-I, in which RJD was a coalition partner, had an agenda and common minimum programme, which the UPA-II lacks and is content with achieving a mere 100-day target.

There is a crisis of leadership at the Centre to steer the country out of the "mess", he said, adding, "Nothing tangible is visible in checking rising prices of essential commodities, rampant unemployment and problems before farmers and the health and education sectors."

Prasad hit out at the JD(U) and the BJP, together accounting for 33 of the 40 Lok Sabha members from Bihar, saying they were unable to champion the cause of the state before the Centre.

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