Why Prashant Kishor is struggling to crack the Muslim-Yadav code in Bihar

Jan Suraaj chief Prashant Kishor addressing a press conference in Patna on Friday. PTI)

By - Khalid Akhter

Political strategist-turned-politician and Jan Suraaj Party founder Prashant Kishor has emerged as one of the most discussed figures in Bihar's election landscape with just a few weeks to go for the polls to be announced by the Election Commission of India.

While the special intensive revision of the voter list in Bihar and the ‘vote chori’ allegations levelled by Rahul Gandhi continue to form a major part of the Opposition’s narrative against the NDA, Kishor is banking on tall promises and claims to find political ground in Bihar’s caste-based politics.

Kishor has resorted to raising issues relevant to the Muslim community and making bold statements in a targeted bid to woo Muslim voters in the state who account for 17.7% of its population, as per the Bihar caste-based survey of 2022.

He has accused the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) of using the ‘M’ factor of the ‘M-Y’ combination to bring Yadavs to power in the state and neglecting the Muslim community. According to him, Muslim voters support RJD’s candidates from the Yadav or other Hindu communities, the inverse does not apply when it fields a Muslim candidate. Yadav voters, Kishor claims, withhold their support, limiting their votes along caste and community lines.

There is no doubt that a significant majority of Muslim voters support the Mahagathbandhan across caste and regional divides.

Like in many other states, the Muslim voting pattern in Bihar has been fairly consistent: Muslim voters tend to vote against the BJP and distance themselves from its allies. They have been voting for the candidates of Mahagathbandhan partners in different elections, irrespective of their religion or caste.

The JD(U), on the other hand, has faced disapproval from the Muslim electorate whenever it has contested elections in alliance with the BJP. Conversely, whenever Nitish Kumar has fought elections independently or as part of the Grand Alliance, Muslim voters have extended him strong support. However, when a Muslim candidate contests, many voters from the alliance’s base tend to restrict their votes based on caste and community affiliations.

In the 2020 Assembly elections, the RJD fielded 18 Muslim candidates, out of which only 8 won. In the 2015 elections, the party gave tickets to 16 Muslim candidates, and 12 of them secured victory.

It is important to note that the 2015 elections were an exception in Bihar’s political landscape during the Lalu-Nitish era, as RJD and JD(U) had a pre-poll alliance, whereas they have mostly formed alliances post polls at different times. In the 2010 Assembly elections, 30 Muslim candidates were fielded, but only 6 were successful.

Recently, Kishor stated that based on Bihar’s Muslim population, the Assembly should have around 40 Muslim MLAs, but the actual number is far lower. He accused the RJD of snatching the rights (political representation) of Muslims and challenged Tejashwi Yadav to give tickets to 40 Muslim candidates.

To win Muslim trust, he also announced that in the upcoming elections, 40 Muslim candidates would be fielded by his party Jan Suraj across the 243 seats in the state.

If we look at the prevailing political sentiment of Muslims in Bihar, there is a growing fear in the community that if the NDA wins the elections, the BJP might sideline Nitish Kumar and install its own Chief Minister, resulting in a situation like Uttar Pradesh. This fear is leading Muslims to rally behind the Mahagathbandhan.

Kishor was informed by his team about this fear and the resulting consolidation of Muslim voters in favour of the Opposition. As a sharp political analyst, he attempted to capitalise on this fear and made a bold statement hoping to attract Muslim voters: "Agar musalmaan saath dein to Uttar Pradesh mein Yogi ko thok denge. (If Muslims support me then we will deal with Yogi in UP".

Kishor and his team hoped the statement would go viral, spark discussions among Muslims, and help him gain traction in the community. However, the statement failed to land, leaving his team puzzled.

The reason lies in his image among Muslims, shaped by his role as the election campaign strategist for Narendra Modi during the 2012 Gujarat Assembly elections and, more significantly, the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Muslims consider Kishor as chief architect of these campaigns, making it difficult for them to trust him or his statements.

This sentiment reflected in C-Voter’s tracker data on Muslim voting preferences. According to the data, while 52.3% of Muslims prefer Tejashwi Yadav as the next Chief Minister, 17.4% favor Nitish Kumar while only 13.6% support Prashant Kishor for the role.

The fact that only 13.6% of Muslims want Kishor as the next Chief Minister clearly shows that the community does not trust him and that it would take him considerable time and effort to shed his past baggage to win them over. Once he earns that trust, Muslims will start voting for him, which is often difficult for new political players attempting to carve space for themselves.

The impact of the Muslim vote was visible in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh, where voters from the community overwhelmingly voted for the Samajwadi-Congress alliance, except for Nagina Lok Sabha seat where they voted for Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Raavan, who secured a decisive victory.

Notably, Nagina is a reserved Lok Sabha constituency with over 40% of Muslims voters. Chandrashekhar supported Muslims during the CAA-NRC protest, went to jail, and continued to raise their issues—earning the electoral reward in return.

For now, despite Prashant Kishor’s tall claims and promises, Muslims in Bihar do not appear to be backing him and are instead consolidating behind the Mahagathbandhan.

(The author is Editor, CVoter News Services. The views expressed are the author's own.)