Is it end of the road for Prashant Kishor in JD (U)?

Nearly six months after he made his maiden entry into the hurly-burly of Indian politics and joined the Janata Dal (United), poll strategist Prashant Kishor finds himself completely isolated in the regional outfit.

Being anointed as National vice-president in October last year, a position which virtually made him the number two in the party after Nitish Kumar, Prashant Kishor is these days in the line of fire.

The JD (U) leadership is miffed with him for issuing controversial statements and exceeding his brief. Nitish’s close aides RCP Singh and Neeraj Kumar have advised him “not to give too much ‘Gyan’ (knowledge) about those things which he was not aware of.”

How It Started

Kishor, in an interview to a website, recently said that Nitish should have sought a fresh mandate instead of joining hands with the BJP in July 2017 when he dumped the grand alliance and formed a government with the help of the BJP-led NDA. In this context, Kishor hastened to add, “For those who saw in him (Nitish Kumar) a formidable challenger to Narendra Modi, felt let down.”

The message was multi-purpose. It corroborated the RJD-Congress stand that “Nitish committed dacoity with people’s mandate which had decisively defeated BJP in the 2015 Bihar Assembly polls”. It also sent a message to Nitish that his action (of realignment) was not “morally correct”.

He was also in the news for making another politically incorrect statement. A couple of days back, he said in Muzaffarpur, “If I could make PM and CM, why can’t I help youths become MLA, MP or mukhiya.”

An embarrassed JD (U) not only distanced itself with his statements but its spokesperson Neeraj reprimanded Kishor saying “In a democracy, it’s the voters who elect MP and MLA.”

Kishor was in the news for his recent tweets too. While one was related to praising Priyanka Gandhi for her “much-awaited entry to politics”, the other was when he offered an apology soon after no ministers, including the CM and Dy CM, paid their last respects to the martyr Pintu Singh when his body was flown to Patna airport on March 3 (the day PM Modi addressed a rally here).

Kishor, through his tweets, had also admonished ‘andh desh bhakts’ (blind nationalists) who were advocating for war with Pakistan.

Against this backdrop, it seems highly unlikely that Kishor would continue in a party where, though he is national vice-president but is being admonished by Rajya Sabha member RCP Singh and spokesperson Neeraj Kumar.

“I have worked with Nitish closely. Those who speak against his ‘line’, are always under the risk of getting the boot,” said former MP, Shivanand Tiwary, who was a founder member of Nitish’s Samata Party before parting ways.