Jan Suraaj supremo Prashant Kishor.
Credit: PTI
New Delhi: Poll strategist Prashant Kishor proved to be the biggest non-story of the Bihar election. Kishor’s high decibel, tech savvy campaign failed to cut much ice with the electorate as his Jan Suraaj Party, which contested 238 out of the total 243 assembly seats, could not open its account.
In fact, the majority of his candidates lost deposits. His party is not even featured in the vote share graph of the Election Commission of India (ECI). If a candidate fails to secure more than one-sixth of the total valid votes polled in their constituency, its security deposits are forfeited.
In many seats, Jan Suraaj party candidates received less votes than the NOTA (None of the Above) category. Its overall vote share is just around 2%.
During the election campaign he had often maintained that his party would either perform exceptionally well by winning over 150 seats or end in a debacle. “Arsh par ya farsh par” was his often repeated quote.
The election results clearly show that the people of Bihar have effectively put his political ambition 'farsh par' (on the floor).
Why has the master political strategist failed so miserably in his mass politics venture? In the words of his own party colleague, he failed to understand the people of Bihar.
“We have been saying from the start that we are trying to bring new politics to Bihar. It is tough to take this politics to the people of Bihar. Prashant Kishor always said if people understood what we were saying, we would be on top; if they didn’t, we would fail. These trends show that people have failed to understand us, and we also failed to make them understand,” Jan Suraaj Party Bihar president Manoj Bharti told PTI.
Pavan K Varma, JSP spokesperson, said the party would undertake a "serious review" of its performance in the Bihar elections.