Prashant Kishor won the Bankipur by-election in Bihar by 18,953 votes on Monday, August 3. The seat had been a BJP bastion since 1995. BJP counting agents walked out of the counting centre as the margin grew, and the party conceded.
It is Kishor’s first run for office. After round 23 he had 46,377 votes against 33,108 for the BJP’s Neeraj Sinha, with Rekha Kumari of the RJD far back on 10,925. Two rounds later he stood at 50,976.
The reversal is sharp. Nine months earlier, his Jan Suraaj Party had contested 238 of the 243 seats in the Bihar Assembly election and won none. In Bankipur its candidate, Vandana Kumari, polled fewer than 10,000 votes, while the BJP’s Nitin Nabin took the seat with more than 98,000.
Nabin vacated it when he moved to the national job of BJP president. That set up the by-election.
What Kishor said
“30-year stronghold fell in 30 days,” Kishor said, adding that the result was about more than electing an MLA. He said Bihar wants a chief minister who can improve education, create jobs and keep young people from having to migrate for work. “We do not want to become MLAs merely to award contracts,” he said.
Before counting began, he had predicted the BJP would lose by so much that it would never again claim it could win “even if they give election tickets to cats and dogs.”
Turnout was 34.24 percent, according to the Election Commission, well below the 41.45 percent recorded in the November Assembly election.
Jan Suraaj also complained to the Election Commission about the Patna Police. Kishor alleged that police illegally detained 54 party leaders and supporters before polling and that they acted at the BJP’s behest. He said the Patna Senior Superintendent of Police had told him outsiders were held during the 48-hour silence period to keep order, but that many of those detained were local residents. The party said it has given the commission its evidence.
Reaction
Nabin accepted the verdict on X. “We accept the mandate received in today’s three assembly by-elections,” he wrote, and said the party would carry out a “thorough introspection” of the results in Bankipur and in Datia, Madhya Pradesh, which the BJP also lost. The party held the Manjalpur seat in Gujarat.
MP Derek O’Brien called Kishor’s lead the “beginning of the end.” Others urged restraint. Senior journalist Pradeep Singh pointed to the 2018 Gorakhpur Lok Sabha by-election, which the BJP lost before winning the seat back by a huge margin in the 2019 general election. By-election results, he said, are no clear guide to future Assembly contests.
Vandana Kumari offered one reading of the swing. Voting in 2025, she said, many people feared a vote for Jan Suraaj would help the RJD win. A by-election, she argued, is about picking a local MLA, not a chief minister. Kishor himself did not stand in 2025.
Sources
- Bankipur Bypoll Result 2026 Highlights: Jan Suraaj Party's Prashant Kishor wins BJP's Bihar stronghold by nearly 19,000 votes
- Will conduct thorough introspection of bypoll results in Bankipur, Datia: BJP chief Nabin
- Bankipur by-poll results: Prashant Kishor set to script history, 9 months after Bihar assembly polls debacle; what helped Jan Suraaj turn the tide?
