Election strategist Prashant Kishor on Sunday joined the Janata Dal United (JDU) in the presence of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in Patna, Bihar. Kishore joint the JDU at the party state executive meeting, attended by Senior JDU leader KC Tyagi, among others.
Ahead of joining the JDU, The master strategist had tweeted that he was "excited" to start his new journey. He took to microblogging site Twitter, saying, "Excited to start my new journey from Bihar!".
The bonding between Nitish Kumar and Prashant Kishor had emerged during the Bihar Assembly elections in 2015, when the Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) had handled the campaign for the Bihar Chief Minister. The JDU was then a part of the Mahagathbandhan, comprising the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Congress party. The alliance had emerged victorious against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), with Nitish retaining his chief ministeriship.
However, the JDU leader had a fallout with Lalu Prasad Yadav's RJD, following which he joined hands with the BJP. The alliance is currently in power in the state.
Following the results, Prashant Kishor was appointed by the JDU leader as an advisor to his government on policies and programme implementation.
Kishor’s appointment was challenged in the Supreme Court through a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by one Rajesh Kumar Jaiswal. The top court, however, dismissed his PIL saying the Chief Minister had done nothing wrong in appointing Kishor as his advisor.
A bench headed by then Chief Justice of India, JS Khehar, Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice SK Kaul, had said that the Chief Minister was not an expert on all issue and had full authority to appoint advisors for seeking suggestions on issues of public importance.
"He (Nitish Kumar) is chief minister. He can seek advice on various subjects of public importance. He can appoint anyone as his advisor and can pay them accordingly. The chief minister is not an expert who knows everything. There is nothing wrong in the appointment," the bench had said.
Kishor is a public health expert by training and had formerly worked with the United Nations for eight years.
