Prashant Kishor’s activism shows that he is slowly gaining a foothold in Bihar politics. And slowly his political intentions are also becoming apparent. It is also becoming clear who is Prashant Kishor’s target first and who is the last?
Initially, Prashant Kishor used to attack mostly by taking the name of Nitish Kumar. And along with him, he used to mention the Lalu-Rabri regime of the previous decade and a half together, but after some days, he stopped taking names and started talking in hints. Like, failed in ninth standard. Obviously, by saying this, he has been targeting RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav. This tradition of giving messages in politics is very old, and is still in practice.
At present, the effect of Prashant Kishor’s activism has been seen in the opposition party Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar. That is why the Bihar RJD president had to issue a circular to warn his leaders and workers to be careful of Prashant Kishor. This can also be understood in the same way as Mayawati in UP has been warning the Dalit community about Bhim Army’s Chandrashekhar Azad from the very beginning. Despite this, Chandrashekhar Azad has reached the Parliament by winning the election from Nagina Lok Sabha seat.
To corner Prashant Kishor, his caste is being repeatedly brought up. Obviously, these people will be the same political opponents of Prashant Kishor, who will be trying to finish him off by dragging him into caste politics. Nitish Kumar, along with Tejashwi Yadav, has already conducted caste census in Bihar – but since Nitish Kumar has joined hands with BJP, Tejashwi Yadav, along with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, is running a campaign for caste census.
Prashant Kishor is responding to such attacks from time to time, and also asking questions. Prashant Kishor says, the population of Brahmins in Bihar is more than the Kursi community from which Nitish Kumar comes. And then he asks, if a Kurmi leader can lead, why can’t a Brahmin? When questions are raised on his Brahmin caste, he asks, where is it written in the Constitution that upper castes cannot make any political attempt? He says, I don’t do caste politics, but some people are finding Pandey in my name. When Prashant Kishor says this, even if he takes the name of Nitish Kumar, Tejashwi Yadav remains the target.
Earlier Prashant Kishor had talked about giving tickets to 40 women in the next Bihar assembly elections, but now he has started talking about Muslims in the same way. Regarding women, Prashant Kishor says that he will definitely give tickets to 40 women in the 2025 elections, and if everything goes well, the number of women candidates can reach 80 in 2030. Keep in mind, Nitish Kumar always tries to keep the women vote bank in his favor in Bihar, and the same reason is behind everything from giving bicycles to girls to implementing prohibition in Bihar.
If Prashant Kishor is targeting Nitish Kumar through the women card, then his Muslim card targets Tejashwi Yadav and his party RJD. Prashant Kishor, popularly known as PK in the country’s political circles, has announced that 40 Muslim candidates will be fielded in the upcoming assembly elections on behalf of Jan Suraj.
RJD’s Muslim voters are PK’s target
In the beginning, the Jan Suraj campaign went from village to village, but recently many programs have been held in Patna. In one such program of Jan Suraj, ‘Participation of Muslims in Politics’, Prashant Kishore has announced to field at least 40 Muslim candidates in the Bihar assembly elections.
Prashant Kishor has also said that the participation of Muslim leaders will be ensured in the core team of Jan Suraj. According to Prashant Kishor, a core team of 25 people is being formed in Jan Suraj, and it will also have 4-5 Muslim leaders.
If we look at the political history of Bihar, Muslim voters have been with Lalu Yadav’s party RJD for a long time. Earlier, most of the voters used to be from Congress, and later when the influence of BJP started increasing, Congress started being accused of Muslim appeasement, and that trend continues even today.
Tejashwi Yadav, in the political legacy he inherited from his father, does politics by uniting Muslims and Yadavs, which is famous as the MY factor in Bihar politics. Currently, only two people play a role in bringing RJD to power or keeping it in the opposition – one is the Muslim voter and the other is Nitish Kumar.
If Prashant Kishor unites the Muslim leaders of Bihar, breaks the disgruntled Muslim leaders of RJD and makes them agree to join Jan Suraj – and somehow makes a dent in the Muslim vote bank, then he can cause a lot of damage to RJD.
Meaning of PK’s infiltration in Muslim vote bank
In the 2020 Bihar assembly elections, Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi had raised the concerns of many by getting 5 AIMIM candidates elected. It is a different matter that later 4 of them also joined RJD, in which Nitish Kumar played an important role.
Prashant Kishor has already made many statements while addressing the Muslim community, and this is the reason why RJD leader Jagdanand Singh has accused Prashant Kishor of being BJP’s B team a few days ago – but is there any substance in Jagdanand Singh’s allegations against Prashant Kishor?
This can be understood in such a way that whether the Muslim voter remains completely with RJD or some of them decide to go with Prashant Kishore? If RJD is harmed due to division of Muslim votes, then obviously BJP will get the full benefit of it.
The way Prashant Kishor has started wooing Muslim voters, a similar role was seen of former UP Chief Minister Mayawati in the 2022 UP assembly elections and Azamgarh Lok Sabha by-election. Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has even accused Mayawati of being an undeclared spokesperson of the BJP. And if seen from that perspective, Jagadanand Singh’s allegations against Prashant Kishor also do not seem to be merely political.
One side of the picture is clear. Prashant Kishor has started trying to snatch Muslim votes from RJD, the other side of the picture is yet to be clear whether he is doing this for the same reason as RJD leaders think?
Source (PTI) (NDTV) (HINDUSTANTIMES)