Bihar seems cursed in one sense. Every two decades or so, it finds itself encumbered by the weight of yet another rhetoric of fundamental transformation. In the early 2000s, Nitish Kumar pledged to pull Bihar out of its then statis of timeless backwardness. His vision of sushashan – good governance – was supposed to eliminate the ‘jungle raj’ established by his predecessor. Two decades later, Prashant Kishor has taken up the mantle to do that job, albeit afresh. His is no continuity from where Kumar left. In its long journey of around twenty years, sushashan danced merrily around the musical chair of power to become, in Kishor’s estimation, one of the most corrupt regimes of Bihar. As the clock turned backward a new voice and a new leader – with an old, repetitive promise of change – has emerged to lead the way. Either Bihar is too stubborn to yield to transformation, or its decadal aspirational leaders are impressively relentless in achieving the unachievable. Kishor, endearingly called PK, leads the surge in air- and screen-time the Bihar politicians are currently receiving. He is smart, articulate, and defiant; he exudes combativeness which makes his interviews and bytes engaging, even entertaining. One senses he relishes the touch of crafted abrasiveness towards the media to garner viewership, knowing well how the noise-economy of electronic and social media works. His use of local language, intonation, humour, and earthy examples makes him relatable. He has gained popularity and endorsements in Bihar and also from NRBs (non-resident Biharis) within India and outside. The question, then, is this: what exactly is the PK phenomenon and what does it symbolise? What does he stand for, and equally, what does a section of his supporters represent? The emergence of mercenary strategist and a politicianSometimes, fantasy paves the way for reality. The 2010 Hindi political thriller film, Rajneeti introduced us to an Excel sheet-wielding data cruncher political organiser who masterminded his brother’s electoral victory while remaining behind the scene himself. In 2014, Kishor did something remarkably similar. He played a key role in India having its one of the most beloved and controversial prime ministers, Narendra Modi. But there was a significant difference between the fantasy and the reality. In the film, the helping hand came from within the family to strengthen dynastic politics. In 2014, however, the help came from outside – from a hired professional serving a political entity that proclaimed to dislodge dynastic but also stood for divisive politics. PK contributed to rebranding communal politics palatable under the name of development.The subsequent history of that help, service, and support to various political parties, and PK’s own journey from a backseat strategist to a frontline political actor, reveals something unprecedented. Perhaps for the first time in Indian politics we witnessed the emergence of a mercenary person and a corporate apparatus that created jingles, slogans, and posters, and conducted surveys for its political clients at such an organised, professionalised, and deeply de-ideologised scale.Being a seasoned strategist, PK understood that a direct plunge into Indian politics required footwork of ground mobilisation. He returned to his roots – Bihar – to start what he variously calls an organisation, a vyavastha, a platform to create a new system, which now, for all practical purposes, is a political party. But he still required to create a strong justification for a new political outfit within the political context of Bihar and India. As he vociferously stands against the role of movement or andolan in political transformation, he couldn’t attribute the birth of Jan Suraj – his political front – to any organically developed people’s movement. Also read: ‘Nothing is Well’: Cracks Appear in NDA Seat Sharing Deal Ahead of Bihar ElectionsAs Bihar remains perennially in search of change, PK took to the predictable route of situating his rhetoric in the narrative of state’s backwardness. Yet, in doing so, he reveals a dilemma. He is caught between the compulsion of using people to establish legitimacy and the inherently personality-driven nature of his efforts. Although his political outlook is distinctly anti-movement, he paradoxically invokes a Gandhian strategy of connecting with people through marches and journeys. He ignores the fact that Gandhi was the master of consolidating movements. He tries hard to become one with all in this ‘alliance with the people’—to use his own words—but has failed to make Jan Suraj visible through a group of co-activists. He remains the sole spokesperson of this alliance. It is precisely at this level of organization and vision of politics that PK’s aggressive charm and his numerical-analytical adeptness still leave ample room for scepticism. I outline three grounds for that scepticism.Ideology and politicsPolitics without ideology is like body without spine or a ship without destination. It can be good, bad, or meaningless depending on what it becomes to be, but particularly for PK who in his previous life has worked for political outfits that don’t see eye to eye, it is extra important to come clean on the question of ideology. In multiple interviews, he can be heard saying that most of the cruelties in history has taken place in the name of ideology. Hence, he claims, pragmatism is more important than ideology. He forgets the point that a vision of politics anchored in ideology is miles different from power misusing, distorting, and criminally weaponizing that ideology. Where, for him, does pragmatism stop and opportunism begin? Prashant Kishor speaks during release of the party’s second list of candidates for the upcoming Bihar assembly elections 2025 in Patna on October 13, 2025. Photo: PTII do not use the term opportunism to imply that he would do a Nitish Kumar. Perhaps, one can trust him that he won’t form shifting alliances with any political party in the near future. He has confessed to having big ambitions. He will most likely go national depending on the results of Bihar election. In the past, his brief stint as a cabinet rank office bearer in the Bihar government where he planned to work backstage as a strategist-advisor and his failed attempt to revamp the Congress party by becoming its chief architect, pulling strings from behind, gives strong impression that he enjoys power, and enjoys it unshared. The only shift is now he had to come to the front to seek power from the people. In all likelihood, he is willing to wait and work to attain that complete power.But the bigger question is, has he given enough assurance against ideological opportunism? In multiple interviews, he outlines the differences between his outfit and that of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), but possibilities of overlap are haunting. Policy-driven mode of governance is no substitute for ideologically defined vision of politics. Good schools, hospitals, roads, and increased opportunities of employment are necessary. But they come better in a vision that empowers people for freedom and equality. Nazi Germany had built one of the most modern systems of highways. The ideology behind development gives perspective to the actual objects of development. A patriarch curtailing the rights of women can build a school. A person practising casteism can establish a hospital. And a politician not showing courage to question the politics of majoritarianism and authoritarianism can create a network of good roads. Ironically, PK’s insistence on changing the ‘culture of governance’ falls flat on his, rather deliberately crafted, ambiguous position on the ‘ideology of governance’.It is no secret that India is currently ruled by a right-wing government, and a massive social transformation has already taken place in which politicised religious identity has become the bearer of social division. PK needs to have a clear stance on the question of ideology of rule, social transformation, and communalism-fuelled majoritarianism in his vision of establishing a progressive and just society.The caste of social life The question of social transformation brings me to the second point, which is of caste. First, on the political usage of caste as a factor of electoral analysis. I tend to agree with him that Bihar is no unique in displaying the strength of caste in ways electoral engineering is done by political parties. In every state of India caste plays a crucial role and so does it in Bihar. In the mainstream media as well as in the echo-chambers of political analysis, sometimes backwardness and poverty on the one hand and caste-driven politics on the other are presented in a cause-effect relationship. Because Bihar is economically backward and poor, caste is described as the dominant tool of making electoral choices. In reality, rich, educated classes and communities also practice caste both in their social life as well as in their political choices. In richer states of India as well, caste is an important political and electoral factor.This brings us to the second aspect of caste as a force of governance beyond electoral factor. Here too, PK is well within reasonable parameters to argue that ‘socialjustice politics’ of the last thirty-forty years has failed to bring in as much qualitative change in the lives of the so-called lower caste people as it should have. The empowerment to question caste-based domination did not result in the betterment of the quality of life of the so-called lower caste groups. The real problem arises when PK almost comes across as dismissing caste as a fact of social reality and reduces it to an inconsequential entity. He removes caste fromPrashant Kishor during an iftar party in Patna on March 18, 2025. Photo: PTI.the everyday reality of power, privilege, discrimination, humiliation, and even death and presents it simply as an instrument of politicisation and misuse. In his hands, caste becomes a tool to understand and berate his political opponents. It comes across only as a force of manipulation in the hands of caste-leaders who apparently have fooled people through it. Unfortunately, the reality of modern India is that caste is much more than a factor of electoral number-crunching and political misutilisation, so to say. It is a system that defines work and stigma, it is a structure that determines economic well-being. It functions as an unsaid code that perpetuates everyday discrimination, and operates as an instrument that repeatedly gets weaponised in the hands of the so-called upper caste people to inflict brutal forms of violence on those they perceive lower than them in the caste-hierarchy. When PK, in his critique of social justice politics, blemishes caste itself as a vital force of social inequality, he betrays that strand of liberal blindness in which disavowal of caste is possible only by those who have privileges borne out of caste status. In other words, only the so-called upper-caste people can claim to be casteless and deny its real existence in the lives of those who have historically being discriminated and continue to be done so in the name of caste.For an individual, like him, it may fittingly happen that caste is neither a source of shame nor privilege. But caste is not an individual entity alone. It is a collective ascription based on creation of hierarchy. A new kind of politics must aspire to create a casteless society but the journey towards it will not succeed by negating its presence.In his rallies and speeches, he often asks people to vote by rising above caste. He invokes them to think about the future of their children. Seldom or never does he draw upon a very well-established historical trajectory of public discourse on caste reform which urges the so called upper-caste people to practice inter-caste marriage, for instance. A new future of progress and prosperity for children is indeed laudable but in proposing it, what he actually does is this: he brackets caste as a regressive source of political choice exercised by the so-called lower caste people, leaving the stigma of its presence in their social sphere unchallenged. PK’s proposed future needs a clear articulation on the nature of casteless society in which caste-borne inequalities are directly addressed, questioned, and criticised in the everyday social interactions among people.The support, the legacyHis evasive stance on the question of social discrimination brings me to the last point. This is on the nature of his support base. While the real picture of it will become clear only after the elections, it seems evident that a certain section of the BJP supporters, impressed by his new line of rhetoric, are seriously considering voting for him. In my understanding, they are mostly urban, educated, middle-class, and upper castes men and women. These men and women have always believed in their struggle-filled journeys to success. They take pride in the merit they think they have acquired only through their hard work. Alternately, the Bihar middle class attributes its failure to the politics of reservation and caste. They see caste-based politics as an impediment to the making of a just society which in turn should solely be based upon meritocracy, without questioning how inherited privilege of caste contributes to the acquisition of merit. In their views, reservation is the ugliest policy independent India could have adopted. Politically, they have not become less of Modi-Shah admirers. But at the regional level, they might have been toying the idea of shifting their loyalty to PK, at least momentarily. Prashant Kishor with supporters participated in the ‘Vidhan Sabha’ march to highlight the alleged failures of the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government in Patna on July 23, 2025. Photo: PTIThis profile of people has grown anxious of perennially being parked in the waiting room of development whose name is Bihar. They want to join the falsely constructed narrative of modernity which is casteless. But they feel ashamed of coming from a region which has been constantly presented as a society where nothing triumphs over caste. Not so surprisingly, they do not see the political use of religion in the same way – as a weaponised force of social division – as they perceive caste. Therefore, while embracing Hindutva, their ire is directed towards caste-based politics as it is seen as source of corruption, a hinderance to the ‘rule of merit’, and an unnecessary divisive force within the fold of Hindutva.This combination of belief in meritocracy and selective disdain towards caste but not religion as a tool of political mobilisation is what PK stands for them. PK’s tirade against the social justice politics appeals to this section of middle class. In PK, they possibly see a redemption of their long unfulfilled desire. PK confirms to their misplaced utopia of casteless society in which their privileges will remain largely unquestioned. But for PK the more pertinent question should be: does he want to only become the vehicle of the realisation of such a dream catering to ‘Bihari pride’ by ushering in a highly technocratic idea of development and using it gloss over roots of social inequalities or does he want to position himself – through vision and ideology – as a maker of new kind of politics which goes beyond policies and deliveries into addressing structures of social injustices. Time will tell. Good luck to him. Nitin Sinha is a senior research fellow at Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin.