Eight months after his fledgling Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) drew a blank in the Bihar Assembly elections, the party founder, Prashant Kishor, on Monday pulled off a resounding win in the high-profile Bankipur constituency in Patna, whose bypoll was necessitated after its five-term MLA Nitin Nabin vacated the seat following his elevation as the BJP national president and his subsequent election to the Rajya Sabha.
This was Kishor’s electoral debut as he had not contested himself in the November 2025 Assembly polls despite fielding the JSP candidates in 238 of Bihar’s 243 seats, of whom 236 had lost their deposits. The elections were swept by the BJP-led NDA, which bagged 202 seats as against the RJD-led Mahagathbandhan’s 35 seats.
A major factor in poll strategist-turned-politician Kishor’s victory was the JSP chief himself as he campaigned on the plank of education, jobs and civic issues, rising above the politics of caste and religion traditionally practised by the state’s leading players.
Kishor, 49, who had called this election a “referendum” on Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary and targeted the BJP for its “arrogance”, has now asserted that the bypoll outcome was a message from the Bihar people to the BJP leadership to change its CM.
While Kishor, who founded the JSP in October 2024, will be the party’s lone MLA in the Assembly, he is likely to remain in the spotlight given his high-profile and his victory in the BJP’s key urban bastion.
His bid to champion a “new kind of issue-based politics” would also be tracked closely for its ramifications in the coming Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in the state.
“This is the beginning of a golden age for our party,” Bihar JSP president Manoj Bharti said on Kishor’s victory.
“As an MLA, Kishor will now get more recognition. He will be invited to important meetings on development projects of his area. The administration officials will have to respond to his phones and letters. In the Assembly he will be the leader of his party and will be invited to the meetings of the floor leaders. This would galvanise the JSP activists who were disappointed after the Assembly election results,” a senior Bihar JD(U) leader told The Indian Express.
The JD(U) leader said Kishor’s win is “extraordinary” as bypolls are generally considered a “cakewalk” for any ruling party in a state. “Kishor has defeated the alliance of BJP-JD(U)-LJP(RV) in the seat of the BJP national president. This will boost the morale of Kishor, his followers and JSP workers. New people from other parties would now join him, which will enhance the JSP’s organisational strength,” he said.
Kishor’s success reflects a trend in recent years, where some new political faces have formed their own parties and went on to win the elections, raising hopes among their followers, party workers and support bases about their leadership.
Chandra Shekhar Aazad
Before Kishor, Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Aazad was elected as the MP from Nagina in Uttar Pradesh on the ticket of his Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, in which he defeated the BJP’s candidate by 1.51 lakh votes.
A prominent Dalit leader, Aazad, 38, had contested his first election against UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath from Gorakhpur Urban in 2022, but lost the seat, getting only 3% votes.
After his election as an MP, Aazad has emerged as a major voice for Dalits and Muslims within and outside the House. He is allotted time for participating in debates on various issues in the Lok Sabha besides being accorded protocol of an MP during his movement outside Parliament.
His party candidate Damodar Yadav finished third in the Datia Assembly bypoll in Madhya Pradesh whose result, declared Monday, saw the Congress’s candidate Ghanshyam Singh defeating the BJP’s Ashutosh Tiwari by 6,016 votes with Damodar getting 22,527 votes.
Jairam Mahato
Jairam Mahato a.k.a.’Tiger’ is also the lone MLA of his party, Jharkhand Loktantrik Krantikari Morcha (JLKM), in the Jharkhand Assembly. He contested the 2024 Lok Sabha election as an Independent from Giridih and got 3.47 lakh votes.
The JLKM subsequently got recognition from the Election Commission ahead of the November 2024 Assembly polls in which he was elected from the Durmi seat. He had then also contested from Bermo, but finished as the runner-up there.
A rising OBC Kudmi leader, Mahato, 31, enjoys popularity among youths in Jharkhand. His videos on social media have a huge following. In the videos, he talks about political awareness, “wealth amassed by political leaders”, the poverty of the people, and how “outsiders get government jobs in Jharkhand”. In his election nomination affidavit, he had declared YouTube as a source of his income.
A common feature between Mahato, Aazad and Kishor is that they are young founders of their parties, who have created resonance over their pitch for “change and justice” and “new politics”.
Asaduddin Owaisi
The AIMIM chief and five-term MP from Hyderabad, Asaduddin Owaisi, 57, is the lone member of his party in the Lok Sabha, who has gained traction at the national level for emerging as a key Muslim voice in the country. He is known for raising major national issues, including those having a bearing on the Muslim community, in Parliament and other public forums.
While the AIMIM is an old party, Owaisi has led its expansion, with the party now having several MLAs and councillors in various states including Telangana, Bihar and Maharashtra.
Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) chief Prashant Kishor; AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi; Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Aazad 
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