Prashant Kishor Claims Rs 10,000 Payments to Women Voters Determined Bihar Election Outcome

Jan Suraaj chief Prashant Kishor engaged in a revealing conversation with NDTV's Rahul Kanwal.

Patna:

Prashant Kishor, the former election strategist whose newly formed Jan Suraaj party made its electoral debut in the Bihar Assembly election without success, has alleged that the BJP and JDU coalition secured their landslide victory by distributing Rs 10,000 each to 1.21 crore women voters. He further claimed an additional Rs 2 lakh was promised over six months for self-employment initiatives, effectively purchasing votes.

Speaking to NDTV's Editor-in-Chief Rahul Kanwal in his first post-election interview, Kishor asserted that the Rs 10,000 payment, distributed shortly before voting under the pretext of business startup funding, "was enough to sway votes." This strategy, according to Kishor, enabled Nitish Kumar's JDU to capture 85 seats—42 more than their 2015 performance and 60 beyond Kishor's prediction.

"Rs 10,000 was enough to sway votes. JDU shouldn't have gotten more than 25 seats. The NDA bought votes with cash," he told NDTV, additionally claiming that JDU distributed between Rs 100 and Rs 125 crore across constituencies.

"I firmly believe this... JDU shouldn't have won more than 25 seats. But now they have 'won' 80+, people are telling me 'your analysis was wrong'. It looks wrong on the surface... but, if you look closely, one of the factors is that the government gave Rs 100 to Rs 125 crore to the public (before voting) and, of this amount, 60,000 to 62,000 people were given Rs 10,000 each."

When questioned about comparable welfare programs like BJP's 'Ladli Behna' scheme in Madhya Pradesh announced months before elections there, Kishor highlighted the suspicious timing of the Bihar payouts.

"Yes, some may say a government runs schemes like this (the Rs 10,000 was released under the 'Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana') ... which is fine. But what happened here is that this money was given from the day the manifesto was released to the day the election happened," he explained to NDTV, while also criticizing the Election Commission's inaction on the matter.

During an earlier press conference, Kishor stated his intention to hold the re-elected BJP-JDU alliance accountable for their pre-election promise: "In six months, the Nitish Kumar government should provide self-employment opportunities... so 15 million Bihar people can be freed from poverty... so they don't have to go to Tamil Nadu or Gujarat to look for jobs."

This isn't the first time Kishor or Jan Suraaj representatives have highlighted questionable pre-election financial distributions. On Sunday, Jan Suraaj senior leader Uday Singh alleged that Nitish Kumar's administration had "diverted" Rs 14,000 crore from World Bank funding.

"From June till when the poll was announced, Rs 40,000 crore was splurged by the Nitish Kumar government to purchase votes. The scale was unprecedented. Even a Rs 14,000 crore loan the state received from the World Bank was diverted..."

NDTV Explains | Why Rs 10,000 Is Not Sole Factor Behind Women's Bumper Support For NDA

Mukesh Sahani of the Vikassheel Insaan Party, who was once projected as a potential Deputy Chief Minister but whose party failed to secure any seats, also raised concerns regarding the Rs 10,000 payments.

READ | "Giving Rs 10,000 To Women During Polls...": Mukesh Sahani On Bihar Loss

Kishor, who previously orchestrated successful election campaigns for both BJP and JDU, had predicted a definitive outcome for his party's debut, stating Jan Suraaj would either win significantly or fail completely.

The latter prediction proved accurate. Though Jan Suraaj initially led in four constituencies when counting began on November 14, its performance diminished as tallying progressed, ultimately securing no victories and less than four percent vote share.

READ | "Zero Seats, 99% Candidates Flopped": BJP Mocks Prashant Kishor's Poll Debut

Exit polls had accurately forecast this outcome; NDTV's poll of exit polls had projected just one seat for Jan Suraaj.

When questioned about these results, Kishor, who did not personally contest despite earlier indications he would, told NDTV that while his party failed electorally, they succeeded in reshaping Bihar's political discourse.

READ | "May Be Mistake For Me To Not Contest Bihar Polls": Prashant Kishor To NDTV

Kishor identified four key voter demographics in Bihar: those voting based on caste and religion, those supporting NDA due to fear of Lalu Yadav, and those backing the opposition due to fear of BJP. He claimed Jan Suraaj impacted the first two groups but couldn't influence the latter two.

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