On May 30, Vikas Kumar started from his residence at 6 AM, walked seven kilometres with his friends and reached the pavilion where Prime Minister Narendra Modi was scheduled to address a rally in Bikramganj in Rohtas district of Bihar. Thousands were already present at the venue. “No prime minister has ever come here in my lifetime. Modi ji is the first,” said 30-year-old Kumar while entering Gate No 22 of the pavilion, four hours prior to the arrival of PM Modi.
When asked why he is so keen to listen to the prime minister, he said: “He has made the country stronger and more prosperous. He taught Pakistan a lesson. The whole nation is proud of him.” But has there been any real development under Modi in Bihar? “Absolutely. We used to get only four hours of electricity a day. Now, power cuts are rare. What used to take three hours to reach the Sasaram headquarters, now takes just thirty minutes’ time,” said Kumar.
While the highlight of PM Modi’s Bihar trip was to inaugurate development projects, his visit to Bikramganj was particularly significant. Bikramganj, once a Parliamentary constituency (1962–2008), has long been considered the political heart of the Shahabad region in Bihar. Modi’s visit here—his first in his 11-year tenure as prime minister—was a calculated move by the BJP that could help it regain lost ground in the upcoming Assembly elections in the state.
In the 2020 Assembly elections, the BJP faced a significant blow in Shahabad, which comprises Bhojpur, Rohtas, Kaimur and Buxar districts. Of the 22 Assembly seats, the INDIA bloc won 20, leaving the BJP with just two. The erosion was more visible in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, where all four seats in the region—Arrah, Sasaram, Buxar and Karakat—that had been BJP bastions, were snatched by the Opposition alliance.
The situation is the same in the neighbouring Magadh, which includes Aurangabad, Jehanabad, Gaya, Patliputra and Patna Sahib. Of the 33 Assembly seats in this region, the National Democratic Alliance (BJP and JDU) managed to secure just eight in 2020. The Grand Alliance won all the remaining seats. In total, NDA was able to win only ten seats out of the total 55 seats in Shahabad and Magadh. In 2024, it lost three of its five Lok Sabha seats (that were with the BJP till 2019), with only Gaya and Patna Sahib remaining under the BJP’s control. The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) bagged the rest.
The election figures are a cause a concern for the BJP in these areas. It is making all the possible efforts to win these areas back. According to senior journalist Manikant Thakur, Modi’s rally in Bikramganj is part of a broader strategy. “His focus is on Shahabad because the NDA, particularly the BJP, was rejected here in the last two elections (Assembly and Lok Sabha). This renewed focus on Shahabad is deliberate. They have two areas to focus on. They are trying to rebuild their image and appeal, partly through development promises and partly through emotional issues like Operation Sindoor. Therefore, as a strategy to capitalise on the mood of the country post-Operation Sindoor, PM Modi chose to go to this particular region in Bihar where the BJP is in a weak position,” he says.
PM Modi laid the foundation stone and inaugurated development projects amounting to over Rs 48,500 crore related to electricity, roads, railways, and education for the regions of Bikramganj, Shahabad, and Magadh. A thermal power plant will be constructed in Nabinagar, Aurangabad at a cost of Rs 29,947.91 crore, which will be the second-largest electricity production plant of the NTPC in the country. A three-lane bridge over the Ganga River, costing Rs 368 crore, will be built between Buxar and Uttar Pradesh, which will be approximately 3.2 km long. Additionally, a four-lane highway will be constructed in the Shahabad and Magadh areas at a cost of around Rs 10,000 crore.
However, Thakur believes that emotional issues will have a greater impact in this area than the announcement of projects because PM Modi knows very well that the caste equation in the Shahabad and Magadh region is against him and its effect can only be mitigated by emotional issues like Operation Sindoor.
Dharmsheela Devi, 60, who covered a distance of 20 km to catch a glimpse of PM Modi, thanked him for Operation Sindoor. “Modi is not afraid of anyone and he cannot be suppressed. In the last 60 years, no other PM has done what Modi has. He gave a fitting reply to Pakistan and also worked for the development of the nation,” she says. For her, development indicators are issues like Ram temple and Jammu and Kashmir. “We got Ram Janmabhoomi, our Ram, our temple, and Jammu and Kashmir. What more could we ask for,” she says.
In his 32-minute speech, PM Modi devoted nearly 15 minutes to the cross-border strike. “The day after the heinous terror attack in Pahalgam, I was here in Bihar. I had promised the nation from this very soil that the perpetrators would pay for their atrocious act. I had said that the hideouts of the masters of terrorism would be erased from the earth. I had said that they would receive a punishment greater than imagination. Today, I return having fulfilled that promise,” he said. He went on to claim: “Those who dared to desecrate the ‘sindoor’ of our daughters were reduced to rubble. Pakistan saw what the power of Indian women’s sindoor means. Our forces destroyed their bases within minutes. Their military bases and an air base in Pakistan were destroyed in just a few minutes. This is the ‘new India’, this is the power of new India.”
Modi’s speech centred on sindoor, and he tried to connect it to Bihar. He also mentioned and paid tribute to Mohammad Imtiaz, a soldier from Bihar who was martyred during the operation. He invoked the legacy of Babu Kunwar Singh and called upon Bihar’s youth to continue the tradition of valour and sacrifice.
Modi targeted Lalu’s family and the Congress as well, but an important aspect of this rally was that before Modi, the leaders or ministers from the NDA who spoke on stage focused solely on ‘Operation Sindoor’. It is being said that the BJP and the NDA will make every effort to take advantage of ‘Operation Sindoor’ in Bihar elections through rallies and gatherings, and could benefit from it.
Local journalist Ravi Ranjan, who covers the Shahabad area, also believes that the BJP and Modi are trying to capitalise on ‘Operation Sindoor’ in the Shahabad region, but it is difficult to say how much they will benefit out of it. “People in Bihar are indeed sentimental. But how much this sentiment will dominate the caste equations here remains to be seen in the future,” he says.
A large number of women had gathered at the rally in Bikramganj. The assembled crowd of women is also being politically analysed. “In Shahabad and other parts of Bihar, where the caste equations are against him, PM Modi will emotionally mobilise women in the name of ‘sindoor’. This is also why he focuses on women in his rallies. For this reason, thousands of women are being gathered at his rallies.”
The RJD has dismissed PM Modi and the BJP’s latest political outreach, dubbed ‘Operation Sindoor’, as anti-national, claiming it will have no impact on the people of Bihar.
RJD spokesperson Mrityunjay Tiwari said: “The crowd at Modi’s rally was brought in through the power of the government but it will not turn into votes. The people of Bihar have already rejected them. This so-called ‘deal over sindoor’ will never be accepted by Bihar. The entire nation salutes the bravery, courage, and valour of our armed forces, but it is unfortunate that the BJP is trying to pass off military achievements as their own political success.”
Tiwari further asserted that the INDIA bloc is poised to perform even better in the Shahabad and Magadh regions than in the previous elections.
The RJD and the Left parties, key constituents of the INDIA bloc, hold a strong presence in these regions. Shahabad has historically been a hub of political movements, which has helped the Left establish a solid cadre base across its assembly constituencies. At the same time, the RJD has consistently garnered significant votes here due to the region’s caste dynamics.
Earlier, the Left contested alone in these areas, managing a respectable vote share but failed to convert it into seats. However, the dynamics shifted during the 2020 Assembly elections, when the Left, the RJD, and the Congress joined forces under the Mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance). The combined strength of this coalition became clearly visible. Now, the BJP appears to be targeting this very strength with its so-called ‘Operation Sindoor’, aiming to breach the alliance’s influence.
(Translation by Kaveri Mishra)
