Mukerjee cuts short Bihar visit by a day as Ara event cancelled(Update/Mukherjee)

President Pranab Mukherjee has cut short his proposed visit to Bihar by a day as the event that he was to attend in Ara had been cancelled, sources at Rashtrapati Bhavan said.

President Mukherjee was originally scheduled to visit Bihar on October 26 and 27 to preside over official functions, including a function in Ara, where he was to unveil a statue of former union minister and deputy prime minister Babu Jagjivan Ram.

Rashtrapati Bhavan sources said that since the organisers of the event at Ara had cancelled the program and informed the president's office of the same, the president revised his schedule and cut short his visit to Bihar by a day, and return on the evening of October 26 itself.

Mukherjee also informed BJP MPs from Bihar Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Shahnawaz Hussain, who met him at Rashtrapati Bhavan on Thursday, about his revised schedule.

Earlier, it was reported by the media that President Mukherjee had cut short his visit to Bihar, as the earlier programme clashed with BJP Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's rally in Patna.

"The President told us that he will visit Bihar on October 26 to attend a convocation, but will return back to Delhi the same day," Hussain told media in the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Rudy had said, "We felt concerned that the earlier scheduled hunkar rally of Narendra Modi in Patna on October 27 may cause inconvenience to the President. The President informed us that he will be in Patna on October 26 only for two hours. We are profoundly grateful to the President and will welcome him in Patna."

Modi will address BJP's "Hunkar Rally" in Patna on October 27.

The clash between the President's visit and Modi's rally had become an issue between BJP and its former ally JD(U).