The ruling BJP at the Centre, already under pressure due to the Gen Z protests, has now suffered another major setback. Following protests organised in Delhi by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) over the NEET paper leak issue, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan was forced to resign from his post. For the past several days, Opposition parties have been demanding that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah apologise in Parliament over the police lathi charge on protesting youth. They have also been holding protests on the issue. Amid these developments, the result of the Bankipur Assembly by-election in Bihar has come as a major shock to the BJP. What makes this result particularly significant is that the seat was vacated by BJP national president Nitin Nabin.
Prashant Kishor, founder of the Jan Suraaj Party and a well-known election strategist, won the seat, which had been considered a BJP stronghold for the past 30 years. His victory has emerged as a major political development in the country. Looking at the series of recent events, discussions are gaining momentum that warning bells may be ringing for the BJP at the national level. The BJP is currently in power in Bihar. Losing a seat where the party has enjoyed a stronghold for decades in a by-election is no ordinary setback. In the previous Bihar Assembly elections, Prashant Kishor's party failed to win even a single seat, and Kishor himself did not contest.
However, he entered the fray in this by-election and secured victory in his very first electoral contest. From the time counting began on Monday morning, Prashant Kishor maintained a consistent lead. He eventually defeated BJP candidate Neeraj Kumar by a margin of 20000 votes. Compared with by-election results in other states, this outcome has acquired significant political importance because it involved a seat previously held by the BJP's national president and because the BJP had remained undefeated in the constituency for the past three decades.