[8] He was active in the Bihar Student Movement and was greatly influenced by the socialist ideas of Jayaprakash Narayan and Ram Manohar Lohia.

[10] Yadav was elected to the Lok Sabha for the first time at the age of 27 from Jabalpur in 1974 in a by-poll after the death of incumbent Seth Govind Das.

[14] He contested the 1984 general election as a Lok Dal candidate from Badaun, which he lost against Saleem Iqbal Shervani of Congress.

[19] He obtained his first Central government cabinet position as Minister of Textiles in the V. P. Singh ministry[19][20] He was one of the most powerful members of the cabinet and exerted pressure on V. P. Singh to implement the Mandal Commission report on reservations for OBCs in 1990, which led to widespread protests and brought Caste politics to the forefront.

[19] He won Madhepura seat for Janata Dal in the 1991 general election, with the Jharkhand Party's Anand Mohan finishing in second place.

[21] Lalu's popularity had declined due to his implication with the Fodder Scam and the contest was eagerly watched for what its outcome would say of the electoral preferences of Yadav community.

[3] In the Vajpayee led government, Yadav got a cabinet seat as Minister of Civil Aviation,[25] a position which be held from 13 October 1999 – 1 September 2001.

[30] Lalu Prasad later gave up the Madhepura seat[31] and the ensuing bypoll to fill the vacancy was won by RJD's Pappu Yadav.

[45] His daughter Subhashini Raja Rao joined Indian National Congress just before 2020 Bihar Legislative Assembly election and announced her plans to contest from Bihariganj seat.

[52] Bihar Chief minister Nitish Kumar expressed condolences over the death and announced one day of state mourning.

[9] He was cremated with full state honours on 14 January in his ancestral village of Ankhmau in Madhya Pradesh's Hoshangabad district.