Bihar Assembly polls: Bihar migrants, home for the festive season, are critical voters

As Bihari migrants start returning home ahead of the two major festivals of Diwali (the festival of lights) and Chhath (the offering to the sun deity), the big question is who will get their votes in the State’s Assembly election, scheduled to be held on November 6 and 11.

The new entrant in the Bihar political arena, former poll strategist Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj Party, has gained traction among this key section of the electorate, but migrant voters are still holding their cards close to their chest. Groups of migrants passing through Patna junction on their way to their homes, mostly in the northeastern and northwestern border districts of the State, say they will only take a final decision after reaching home and consulting their family members, friends, and villagers. They predict the contest will be between the NDA and mahagathbandhan (Opposition alliance) this time as, “but it will be a tough one”.

According to the Bihar Caste Survey report for 2022-23, there were 53 lakh families and 2.65 crore people who live outside Bihar as migrants. The 2011 census, however, estimated their population at 74.54 lakh, and some reports say their number is as high as a crore with some political parties claiming there are three crore migrants from the State. Three of the State’s northwest districts — Saran, Siwan and Gopalganj — get the highest remittances, from migrants working in Gulf countries.

‘Stay back to cast votes’

In some constituencies, these voters are expected to play a major role and parties are wooing them for the few weeks they are in the State. The BJP-led NDA government at the Centre has announced that it will run several trains for migrants. “Chhath is when all public meetings are put on hold, our party candidates would move around the Ghats (river banks where Chhath devotees go to offer prayer to the rising and setting Sun deity) to meet them personally,” said BJP leader Vivek Thakur. RJD spokesperson Mrityunjay Tiwari said that the Opposition party’s leaders would also “pursue the migrants to stay back a for few more days after Chhath to cast their vote”.

The trains that regularly chug out to Punjab, Delhi, and other destinations from the Saharsa railway station in northeastern Bihar are popularly known as ‘Palayan (Migration) Express’ trains. At noon on Saturday, however, a huge crowd of migrants throngs Platform number 4 at Patna junction, waiting for the Raj Rani Express, travelling in the opposite direction. Satyam Kumar, 28, is among those heading home to Saharsa after a year in Noida, where he works as a construction labourer. His eyes on his jazzy mobile phone, he adjusts the rexine bag on his back and says he has decided to stay home for a few weeks to cast his vote in the first phase of polling on November 6.

“Prashant Kishor of the Jan Suraaj Party talks sense,” he says, gathering nods from his friends and fellow migrants Himanshu Prasad, Sanjiv Kumar, and Amritanshu Anupam. “We’ve been watching videos of him quite often on our mobile phones while working in Noida but we’ll cast our vote once we reach our homeland and consult our family members, friends and local people to form our firm opinion on whom or which party we should vote for,” he says, before rushing to find a place on the platform to wait for the train.

‘Prashant Kishor needs more time’

Dipankar Bhattacharya of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist), part of the Opposition alliance, claimed that the Jan Suraaj Party has greater “traction” among migrants from Bihar than people actually living in the State.

Sanjeev Bind and his friends are more concerned about the law-and-order situation in their homes in neighbouring Katihar district. “The law-and-order situation had improved but again it has deteriorated in our town. Whoever will improve it, will get our vote. We want to give more time to Mr. Kishor before casting our vote for his party candidate, though whatever he says is correct and connects with us,” he says, sipping tap water from a green bottle. He and his friends work in a small restaurant in the Azadpur area of Delhi.

Outside the station, a long queue of migrants is sitting on steel chairs waiting to enter. Subham Pandey, who earns ₹18,000 per month as a security guard for a multinational company at Gurgaon, clutches his bags as he waits for a train heading to his hometown in Gopalganj district. “Yes, me and my friends from the area have been watching videos of Prashant Kishor on our mobile phones and we are even impressed with whatever he says and the way he has been meeting with people as a political leader while travelling to different districts of the State for the last two-three years. But we’ve made up our mind not to vote for him this time. He needs to work for several years and prove his political credentials first,” says Mr. Pandey. His friends look the other way, apparently shying away from making any political comment at a railway station.

The results of the Bihar Assembly election will be announced on November 14.