Bihar BJP List: Veterans’ Purge, Caste, and Turncoats Key Strategy

BJP’s first Bihar poll list drops veterans, rewards turncoats, and balances castes — signaling a generational shift in state leadership.

By MANISH ANAND

Patna, October 14, 2025 — The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has followed its familiar playbook of purging old faces, striking caste balance, and rewarding turncoats in the first list of 71 candidates announced for the Bihar Assembly elections. While the party retained several sitting MLAs, it refrained from bold experimentation in ticket distribution.

Showing a generational shift, the BJP dropped seven-term MLA Nand Kishore Yadav, an associate of late former deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi, from its list of candidates. The move marks the phasing out of leaders who rose to prominence during the students’ agitations of 1974.

For nearly a decade and a half, Sushil Kumar Modi, Ashwini Kumar Choubey, and Nand Kishore Yadav represented the core of the BJP’s leadership in Bihar, carrying the legacy of the 1974 movement. With Modi’s passing, Choubey’s retirement, and Yadav’s exclusion, the old guard that once helped the BJP share power with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar appears to have been sidelined.

The BJP is also grappling with internal rebellion in Muzaffarpur’s Auraiya Assembly seat, where supporters of denied MLA Ramsurat Rai staged protests at the party office in Patna. The BJP has replaced him with turncoat Rama Nishad, banking on his caste appeal to counter Mukesh Sahni of the Opposition alliance.

In all, the party has denied tickets to 10 sitting MLAs, while reaffirming faith in the two deputy chief ministers, Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha, both renominated from their constituencies.

The BJP’s emphasis on younger candidates is evident in the nomination of Rohit Pandey from Bhagalpur — he lost the last election by just 900 votes — despite lobbying from senior leaders, including Choubey for his son, MP Nishikant Dubey for his spouse, and Shahnawaz Hussain.

Balancing caste remains central to the BJP’s strategy, with focus on extremely backward classes and upper castes. However, the list features only nine women candidates, underscoring a persistent gender gap in the party’s electoral representation.

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About The Author

Manish Anand

Manish Anand is a senior journalist with more than two decades of hardcore reporting on beats such as Prime Minister’s Office, Parliament, BJP, Congress, Planning Commission, NITI Aayog, and scores of Union Ministries.

His past has been with The New Indian Express, The Asian Age/Deccan Chronicle, and The Statesman.

For about 15 years, Manish was also a regular commentator and host for talks on AIR on foreign affairs.

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