Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) founder Prashant Kishor on Sunday predicted a crushing defeat for theBharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the bypoll for Bihar’s Bankipur assembly constituency, where he is making his personal electoral debut and the result of which will be announced on Monday.
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“The BJP will lose by such a big vote margin that they won’t ever have the audacity to say that they can win even if they give election tickets to cats and dogs,” Kishor said at a press conference in Patna.
The Bankipur bypoll, necessitated by the resignation of BJP national presidentNitin Nabin following his election to the Rajya Sabha, was held on Thursday. Kishor is taking on the BJP’s Neeraj Kumar and the RJD’s Rekha Kumari.
The ‘cats and dogs’ controversy
Prashant Kishor alleged through the poll campaign that a BJP leader remarked that “Bankipur is such an impregnable fortress for them that even if they fielded a dog or a cat, the people of Bankipur would still vote for them”.
He used the comment during his campaign to accuse the ruling party of taking voters for granted and treating the electorate with disrespect.
BJP MPRavi Shankar Prasad dismissed the “dog or cat” attribution as a “false and baseless narrative” by opponents, emphasising that the party deeply respects its grassroots workers and democratic processes.
JSP alleges ‘illegal detentions’ of supporters
Prashant Kishor on Sunday also said his party has filed a complaint with the Election Commission of India againstPatna police for “illegally detaining” his party leaders and supporters during the Bankipur assembly byelection, allegedly at the behest of the BJP.
Kishor alleged that 54 people, including a significant number of locals, were detained by the police in two days leading up to the commencement of voting on Thursday.
“Patna SSP falsely claimed that the police detained outsiders during the 48-hour silence period ahead of the voting day to maintain law and order. We have filed a complaint with the ECI and presented evidence that many of the detainees were locals. They also did not violate Section 144 of CrPC (now Section 163 of the BNSS),” Kishor said in the press conference.
Describing Patna SSP Kartikeya K Sharma as “incompetent, motivated and foolish”, Kishor alleged that he (SSP) tried to influence votes by acting in a biased manner. “If the SSP wants to do politics, he should first resign from his post. Everyone has the freedom to do politics in a democracy, but not while sitting in an administrative chair. The incompetent, motivated and foolish man is trying to influence politics, but we are not going to be scared of him,” the strategist-turned-leader said.
He claimed that, at his party’s request, the Bihar DGP and his subordinates assured that “there will be no role of Patna SSP in the counting areas on Monday”.
Apart from Bihar’s Bankipur, the results of bypolls in MP’s Datia andGujarat’s Manjalpur are also scheduled for Monday.
