Bihar Elections 2025: Caste, Power, and the Politics of Identity

As Bihar heads towards the high-stakes Assembly polls in November 2025, the political climate is as caste-ridden as ever, being turbulent, competitive, and identity-heavy, arithmetic-dependent. The state is back at its familiar but vulnerable crossroads of where identity politics remains on top of the ballot box. Long after decades of development and governance promises, electoral triumph in Bihar remains dependent on the math of caste.

Illustration by The Geostrata

The return of old faces, new realignments, and the staging of new narratives implies not a rejection of the past but its reconstruction. With no single frontrunner, the battleground is set for an election that will determine if Bihar's electorate is willing to transcend vested loyalties or once again reinstate them.

What binds all the big players, legacy parties such as the RJD and JD(U), or ambitious entrants such as Prashant Kishor's Jan Suraaj campaign, is an ingrained dependence upon the caste card to stake out 7, Circular Road, Patna, the official residence of Bihar's Chief Minister. Caste is the defining algorithm behind both campaign messaging and voter mobilisation in Bihar.

As pointed out in the latest caste census of 2023 and seen in the tactical caste-wise candidates proposed for Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha, electoral maths remains more influenced by identity blocks rather than by issues or ideology.

Amidst all this, Bihar has also started embracing electoral reforms with new instruments of voter authentication and technology-backed outreach. In 2025, the state initiated a Special Intensive Revision of Electoral Rolls, where almost 2.93 crore voters were requested to provide birth and location proofs, an unprecedented exercise in electoral transparency that may recalibrate voter rolls with caste and demographic accuracy.

Additionally, the state of Bihar has become the first of India's states to adopt voting through an app on its municipal elections, marking a digital shift in voting turnout, albeit whose impact on turnout and accessibility is still to be fully determined.

Even having announced the 2020 polls as his final election, Nitish Kumar is likely to change course now and possibly re-enter the fray, trying to prolong his legacy. Conversely, Opposition leader Tejashwi Yadav remains to base his strategy on dynastic momentum and OBC loyalty. In contrast, the Bharatiya Janata Party, despite its organisational strength, lacks a single charismatic face to lead its electoral hopes in the state, particularly under changing alliance dynamics and the uncertainty surrounding Nitish.

In this polarised and fluid terrain, poll strategist Prashant Kishor has ventured boldly to assert that Nitish Kumar, Tejashwi Yadav, or the BJP cannot give Bihar its future Chief Minister, staking his Jan Suraaj campaign on being a people-focused alternative to politics based on caste. Whether Kishor's risk rewrites history or becomes another footnote in Bihar's dynastic saga will be decided.

But one truth is constant: caste-based politics in Bihar is not a relic of the past—it is the defining grammar of the present. Caste remains king, legacy politics reign supreme, and real transformation feels perpetually one election away. As old leaders contemplate comebacks and alliances mutate by the month, Bihar's voters face the same question cloaked in new rhetoric: who we are or what do we need?

The emergence of Lalu Yadav in 1990 remade the political landscape of Bihar. Pioneering the Mandal Commission recommendation for OBC reservation, Lalu established a base in Yadavs (12–13%) and larger OBC groups (25%).

His election win in 1990 was the consolidation of caste power, supplemented through policy, appointments, and legal protection personalised for backwards castes. While this consolidation was also accompanied by increasing caste tension and violence, the violence was on both sides.

The 1992 Bara Massacre (37 Bhumihars massacred by Maoists) and the 1997 Laxmanpur Bathe Massacre (58 Dalits massacred by Ranvir Sena) indicated deep social fissures. While violence came from both sides, RJD could preserve its base among Yadavs and OBCs by offering itself as their protector.

In 2005, Nitish Kumar presented an alternative to Lalu's perception. However, caste mathematics was still at the heart of his agenda. Being a Kurmi, Nitish built an alliance with Koeris (Kushwahas) and created the "Luv-Kush" bloc. By bringing on board Mahadalits and EBCs along with the BJP's upper-caste core, he created a winning social coalition.

Ministerial selections followed the same cautious balance: Kurmi Nitish Kumar, Bhumihar Sushil Modi, Mahadalit Jitan Ram Manjhi, Yadav Nand Kishore Yadav, and others showed an inclusive but calculated representation. When Nitish resigned briefly in 2014, he appointed Mahadalit Manjhi as CM to strengthen Dalit votes before the 2015 elections, a gamble that worked for the JD(U)-RJD-Congress alliance.

The 2023 caste census, which was a long-pending demand of regional parties, had empirical evidence in support of caste-based politics.

Yadavs formed 14.26% of the population, followed by Kushwahas (4.27%), Brahmins (3.65%), Rajputs (3.45%), Musahars (3.08%), Kurmis (2.87%), Bhumihars (2.86%), and Kayasthas (0.60%). Political parties soon adjusted their approach based on the census. During the 2024 Rajya Sabha polls, there were equal upper caste members (Brahmin, Rajput, Bhumihar) as OBC members (Yadav, Kushwaha, Vaishya) among the eight elected members, reflecting a deliberate balance in caste representation. The BJP nomination of Dillip Jaiswal, an OBC, as the state president further pointed in this direction.

The influence of caste was felt during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections as well. Patna Sahib, where both the BJP and INDIA alliance respectively nominated Kayastha candidates (Ravi Shankar Prasad and Luv Sinha) because of the community's 21% vote share. Nawada, which is Bhumihar-dominated, had Vivek Thakur's nomination, and Giriraj Singh (Bhumihar) from Begusarai, Rajiv Pratap Rudy (Rajput) from Saran, and Rajesh Ranjan (Yadav) from Purnia.

Caste-specific regional parties like the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas), Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular), and Vikassheel Insaan Party still gain their political capital from identity-based support.

In the 2024 election, LJP (Ram Vilas) won three SC-reserved seats, reaffirming its hold among Dalit voters; however, the top five highest polling NOTA constituencies in the State were seats that these parties bagged. HAM(S) leader Jitan Ram Manjhi contested from the SC-dominated Gaya constituency and was subsequently inducted into the Union Cabinet, which was widely seen as a strategic reward for consolidating Mahadalit support.

Meanwhile, Mukesh Sahani’s VIP, which commands a strong following among the Nishad community, remained a valuable alliance partner for major coalitions seeking to tap into backwards caste vote banks.

Jan Suraaj founder Prashant Kishor has issued a dramatic statement: "Neither Nitish Kumar, Tejashwi Yadav, nor the BJP will make Bihar's next Chief Minister—take it in writing." Supported by his assertion that more than 60% of the voters are looking for a change from the existing order, Kishor presents his movement as a post-identity, governance-centred option.

His arrival is the turning point in the political story of Bihar—one that measures if the voter is really willing to break from deep-seated caste allegiances towards issue-driven politics.

June 2025 saw Bihar become the first Indian state to start a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of its electoral rolls, which is an exercise that affects about 2.93 crore of its 7.89 crore eligible voters.

Those not included in the 2003 rolls are now required to give proof of their birth and residence, including parent documents, to establish their eligibility. The exercise is being carried out through more than 98,000 Booth Level Officers and has been protested by opposition parties like Congress and RJD, who say it is likely to disenfranchise migrants and the underprivileged.

At the same time, Bihar also made voting history by being the first state in India to let people vote using a mobile app in its June municipal polls. Approximately 50,000 voters in six municipal councils were able to cast their vote using the Android-based e‑voting facility—a digital innovation intended to boost participation and convenience. Whether this helpful digital infrastructure will carry over to the Assembly elections is unknown, but the trend is a tech-savvy campaign landscape.

Despite the emergence of digital voter reforms and calls for development-oriented politics, caste continues to be the bedrock of Bihar's democratic operation. The assertion of Prashant Kishor that "neither Nitish, Tejashwi, nor BJP will produce Bihar's next CM" is a wish to escape this loop, but history presents minimal reasons for hope. Caste still determines not only representation but also governance, policymaking, and even political stability in Bihar. As the 2025 elections approach, the question is not whether caste will dominate but which configuration of it will rule.

As Bihar charts into its 2025 elections, it finds itself at the crossroads of traditional caste politics and emerging administrative and digital innovations. From SIR’s stringent voter verification drive to the rollout of pilot e-voting and Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj campaign, the state’s electoral canvas is being gradually redrawn. Yet, caste remains the gravitational centre of political strategy. The core question remains: will these new tools and narratives truly dilute identity-based voting, or simply layer modernity onto the same entrenched arithmetic?

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BY BONSIKA DAS

CENTRE OF LAW AND POLITICS

TEAM GEOSTRATA

info@thegeostrata.com