Patna: It’s a slow, languid September afternoon in north Bihar’s Bijaipur. The roads are mostly empty, except for the occasional passing car.
Ajay and his friends stand by the roadside, holding saffron flags. They wait to flag down vehicles and collect ‘chanda’—donations they say are for organising Durga Puja. Business usually picks up after sunset.
Local residents say that’s when the roads come alive, especially in this part of Bihar, near the border with Uttar Pradesh’s Deoria district. That’s also when, they allege, vehicles smuggling liquor into the state begin moving. For Ajay and company, that means more traffic—more chances to ask for donations.
“They (smugglers) are more generous,” Ajay Rai, a Yadav, says with a wry smile, offering a casual reality check on the statewide ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol, implemented by the Nitish Kumar government in April 2016.
No wonder then, that it’s not unusual to see men, barely able to hold a conversation, walking shakily on the streets in Bihar in broad daylight.
Rahul Kumar, a welder from Raxaul, in East Champaran district near the Nepal border, says liquor smuggling is rampant across the international boundary as well.
“You know what the irony is in Bihar? Those who drink, especially the poor, may still get arrested. But those selling the alcohol are making all the money, from smugglers to policemen,” says Rahul, describing the prohibition as Nitish Kumar’s “biggest mistake”.
“Yeh sabse badi bhool hai Nitish Kumar ka,” he says.
On the ground, Jan Suraaj founder Prashant Kishor has tapped into this very resentment, promising to lift the prohibition policy if he comes to power.
Across villages and towns, his pledge to end the liquor ban—“within an hour of coming to power”—has emerged as a talking point, helping Jan Suraaj gain a foothold in Bihar’s complex political landscape, long shaped by deep caste and community divides.
Of course, the promise to lift the liquor ban isn’t Jan Suraaj’s only attraction. For many voters who are not averse to change but don’t consider the RJD as an alternative, Kishor represents a new kind of hope, one that they feel Nitish Kumar embodied in his initial years as CM.
“Why do you think Nitish Kumar has suddenly increased the monthly pensions for senior citizens, widows and people with disabilities from Rs 400 rupees to Rs 1,100? It’s the PK effect,” says Suresh Rai of Gamharia village in Gopalganj district, using the initials by which Prashant Kishor is widely known.
Increasing the monthly pension to Rs 2,000 is part of Kishor’s five-point agenda, which he unveiled in March. Many now joke that since Nitish Kumar appears to be implementing Kishor’s promises, he might as well lift the liquor ban.
“If Nitish Kumar lifts the ban on liquor, then no one will be able to unseat him,” says Surender Kushwaha in Amnour village in Chhapra district, home to Saran MP Rajiv Pratap Rudy. In reality, however, no major political party in Bihar, apart from Jan Suraaj, has openly backed lifting the prohibition, largely due to the unspoken fear of alienating women voters.
There is a widespread perception that the liquor ban helped Nitish Kumar strengthen his support among women voters, as alcohol consumption is often linked to marital discord and domestic violence. In poor households, men are often seen as spending on alcohol rather than necessities.
Nine years after the alcohol ban was imposed, many women do not see value in it anymore as liquor remains widely available in the state. “Instead, men are spending more since smuggled liquor costs more. Sabko pata hai sachhai, sir (everyone knows the reality),” Mina Devi says in Darbhanga’s Singhwara.
In his interviews, Kishor has been arguing that the narrative claiming Nitish Kumar gained women’s support through the liquor ban has no basis as the Janata Dal (United)’s electoral tally has declined over the years since the ban. He also alleges that liquor is not just available widely, but is home delivered in Bihar.
Kishor says that Bihar could have earned Rs 20,000 crore in revenue had alcohol been available in the state legally, an amount which, he alleges, is now being pocketed by the liquor mafia and corrupt government officials. He also claims that the Dalits and the marginalised have been disproportionately hit by cases of consumption of liquor.
There is a broad agreement in the state that the liquor ban has fuelled a thriving parallel economy of illicit alcohol, benefiting a small section of the population, including corrupt police officers, while increasing the risk of illness from consuming cheap, spurious liquor.
“Why is no one else acknowledging the reality? We don’t know if he will get votes. But there are good reasons why people are thinking about Prashant Kishor. His views seem fine. He knows all politicians, including Modi, inside out. Zameen par yatra karke unhone logon ko jaga diya hai muddon pe… (he has travelled and raised awareness)” says Mangal Jha in Singhwara.
Kishor’s argument that lifting the liquor ban would help Bihar generate revenue through alcohol taxes also has found support on the ground, though in some cases, that support appears driven more by the personal desire to drink freely than by economic reasoning.
As Jha quips, “Now people are resorting to drinking cheap liquor. If the ban is lifted, people can drink healthy liquor.”
(Edited by Viny Mishra)
Also read: Nitish is not fit to continue as CM, NDA will lose power in Bihar come November—Prashant Kishor
