Aug 03, 2026 19:32 pm IST

Opinion | Bankipur Is Prashant Kishor's Stinging Comeback. But It Is Also The End Of His 'Excuse'

Kishor's ideological flexibility helped make him a successful strategist, but it remains a political vulnerability.

Rasheed Kidwai Rasheed Kidwai Columnist

Rasheed Kidwai Columnist

Elections are frequently misread through the arithmetic of their size. A Lok Sabha verdict is automatically considered historic, while a by-election is dismissed as a local disturbance. But politics does not always move in proportion to the number of voters involved. Sometimes, one constituency supplies the metaphor for an entire political moment. Bankipur, Bihar, may be such a constituency.

Prashant Kishor's victory in Bankipur on Monday by more than 19,000 votes (at the time of writing) will not alter the numerical balance in the Bihar assembly. Nor should one assembly by-election be inflated into a national referendum on Narendra Modi, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), or the future of the Opposition.

Clubbed with the verdict in Datia, Madhya Pradesh, the bypoll outcomes in the Hindi belt have dealt a blow to the BJP, and, more specifically, to the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah-Nitin Nabin trio. Datia's eastern boundary opens at Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh, taking Monday's verdict to poll-bound Uttar Pradesh. These are early but disturbing signs for the world's biggest political party. The BJP can not blame the Datia loss on infighting or on rebel Narottam Mishra, as the Congress was equally challenged by internal dissent and disquiet, forcing them to suspend former Datia MLA Rajendra Bharti.

Much of the Bankipur verdict lies in changing Kishor's political identity. Until now, he was the man behind victories, defeats, slogans, caste calculations, candidate selection, and campaign choreography. He could explain why others won. He had not demonstrated that voters would choose him.

That distinction matters. Indian politics has no shortage of advisors who believe that proximity to power amounts to possession of it. Kishor has now crossed the invisible but decisive line separating the election manager from the elected politician. Bankipur has not merely given him a seat, but a standing.

The Fortress Falls Loudly

The enormity of the result becomes clearer when placed against Bankipur's electoral history. The BJP has held this urban Patna territory continuously since 1995, when much of it formed the Patna West constituency. Nitin Nabin retained Bankipur for a fifth consecutive term in the 2025 Bihar election. He polled 98,299 votes, defeating the Rashtriya Janata Dal's (RJD) Rekha........

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