Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch his party’s Bihar election campaign today from Samastipur. The Prime Minister will address a public meeting at Dudhpoora Helipad Grounds in Samastipur, 90 km from Patna.
PM Modi will also pay tribute to the birthplace of socialist icon and former Bihar chief minister Karpoori Thakur in Samastipur before addressing the rally in the afternoon. Thakur was conferred the Bharat Ratna in 2024 by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government.
Samastipur is significant since the BJP has long been attempting to co-opt Karpoori Thakur’s socialist legacy. Thakur’s paternal village, Karpoori Gram, named after him following his death in 1988, is barely a few kilometres from the PM’s rally venue in Samatipur.
PM Modi, who will be accompanied by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, will address another rally a few miles away in Begusarai.
This would be PM Modi’s first public meeting after the NDA parties announced the seat-sharing deal. The BJP and its senior partner Janata Dal are contesting 101 seats each, while Chirag Paswan’s LJP has fielded candidates on 29 seats in the election to the 243-member house.
Before Friday’s meetings, Prime Minister Modi would address gatherings after inaugurating projects in different parts of Bihar in the run-up to elections.
The NDA is being challenged by the opposition’s Mahathbandhan of the Grand Alliance. Among other parties, the RJD is contesting 143 of the 243 seats of Bihar. Congress is contesting 61 seats, CPI ML is contesting 20, and Mukesh Sahani’s VIP is contesting 15 seats in the INDIA bloc.
The Prime Minister will also address rallies in Bihar on October 30, November 2 and 3, before the first phase of voting for 121 seats on November 6. The second phase of polls on 122 seats would be conducted on November 11. The counting will be held on November 14.
What is the significance of Karpoori Gram?
The choice of Karpoori Gram to kick off Bihar campaign is being seen as the NDA’s effort to woo the Extremely Backward Castes (EBCs), one that Karpoori Thakur came from
Popularly known as ‘Jannayak’, or People’s Leader, Thakur was the son of a marginal farmer from the Nai (barber) community. He served as Bihar chief minister twice – first between December 1970 and June 1971 as part of the Bharatiya Kranti Dal, and later between December 1977 and April 1979 from the Janata Party.
Thakur was instrumental in slicing off a bracket of the EBCs which later ensured a separate reservation for the community in government services in 1978.
EBCs account for 36 per cent of Bihar’s population and are a sub-group within the Other Backwards Classes. The community is said to decide the winner in closely fought elections and each party tries to woo its members.
‘Jungle raj’ in Bihar
On Thursday, the PM slammed the opposition while addressing a virtual event, saying that people will not forget the era of ‘jungle raj’ in Bihar, no matter how hard the opposition tries otherwise.
The Prime Minister was speaking via audio conferencing at the “Mera Booth Sabse Mazboot: Yuva Samvaad” event on the day Tejashwi Yadav was declared the Grand Alliance’s chief ministerial candidate for the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections.
“People will not forget for another 100 years ‘Jungle Raj’ in Bihar, no matter how much the Opposition tries to hide their misdeeds. Nitish ji and NDA worked hard to bring Bihar out of ‘jungle raj’, establish rule of law; now people proudly call themselves Bihari We are moving fast towards eradicating Naxalism and Maoist terrorism in Bihar,” Modi said.