PATNA: With Jan Suraaj Party’s dismal performance in the by-polls to all four seats in Bihar, former election strategist Prashant Kishor has to fine-tune its strategy afresh if it has to put up a good show in the state assembly election due next year. Not only did the party’s all four candidates suffered a humiliating defeat, but three of them even forfeited their deposits in bypolls, the results of which were announced on Saturday. Kishor’s challenge before the assembly election is seemingly great as it would be interesting how he would navigate into the choppy water of the state’s caste-centric politics, remarked a political analyst Indrajit Singh. He said that Jan Suraaj’s role would be restricted to cutting into votes of major parties in the elections instead of winning seats for itself, remarked another political observer. Kishor launched his Jan Suraaj Party on October 2 this year after criss-crossing state’s villages and Panchayats by covering more than 5,000 kms on foot for two years. At the time of launch of his party, Kishor had announced that he would field candidates on all 243 seats of the state assembly election. It would, however, prove to be a daunting task for Kishor to identify the candidates with the potential to win seats for the party. The other huge challenge before Kishor would be to keep morale of his party’s rank and file after the party’s poor performance in the by-elections as it seemed that the party allegedly spoiling victory chances of RJD on two seats including its traditional Belaganj seat could not make any impact in the by-elections. Putting on a brave face, Kishor contended that he was not disappointed over poll results as he would continue to make efforts for his party’s vote share to reach up to 40 per cent in the state, whether it took one year or five years. By-elections were held in Belaganj, Imamganj, Tarari and Ramgarh after its incumbent MLAs were elected to Lok Sabha in the last election. “My party is only one month old and we received our symbol only 10 days before the by-elections. Elections were held in those places which were not covered by Jan Suraaj Yatra and our party was creating a base still it got 10% votes in by-elections,” Kishor said while reacting to the outcome of bypolls.
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