Prashant Kishor's Jan Suraaj Party Fires Over 1,300 Employees Hired Before Bihar Assembly Polls

Patna: Poll strategist–turned–politician Prashant Kishor's Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) has fired around 1,300 staff from the team it had formed for the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections.

The layoffs in the Jan Suraaj Professional Consultancy Private Limited, also known as JSPT, came quietly in November and December last year after the party's forgettable performance in the polls. The party could not win even a single seat in the 243-member House.

The employees were informed via video-conferencing and verbal announcements to put in their papers with assurance that their full and final settlement of wages would be done later. Some of them got their dues on December 31, while others are still waiting for their salaries.

"We had left our comfortable jobs to join Kishor in his endeavour to reform Bihar and its politics. We adopted the dream that he showed, but now we are left in the lurch. Moreover, we were also made to sign a non-disclosure agreement at the time of our joining forbidding us from taking employment with similar poll-related organisations and revealing work-related information to similar institutions," a former JSPT employee told ETV Bharat.

Mass hiring for the consultancy firm was done five months before the Bihar elections. Those who were inducted into the team were supposed to help in the campaigning of JSP candidates. Though the party wanted to contest all the Assembly seats in the state, it could contest only 238, due to technical reasons like rejection of nominations and candidates not turning up to file their papers.

"They never told us that we would be needed only for five months. Had they done it, many of us would not have joined. Nobody wants to risk his/her career. We feel abandoned. The poor performance of the party will leave a blot on our CV for future jobs," another former JSPT employee said.

The first round of mass retrenchment came on November 23-24 and was followed by another on December 12. Its purpose, as told by a staff member of the Human Resources department of the organisation, was "to cut the employee strength to zero". What irked the employees more was the manner in which it was done, with many of them ruing that Kishor did not even bother to address them.

The salary for October was held till the evening of November 14, the day the votes were counted, and the majority of the jobs were lost on November 23 – 24. Many of the retrenched staff vandalised the JSPT office at Hai Complex in Patna in anger, breaking chairs and other utilities to protest the decision.

Over 200 employees were retained, but fired on December 12. The latter got their November salary on December 31. Kishor did not respond to calls and messages from ETV Bharat over the issue.

Asked about the mass retrenchment, JSP media in-charge Obaidur Rahman told ETV Bharat, “We had hired lots of people for the elections. They were to work for different Assembly constituencies to support the party candidates. Now they are not needed, hence have been laid off.”

Rahman added that the JSPT provided a district in-charge, his assistant, a coordinator, a work in-charge and other people for every Assembly constituency to assist the party candidates in the elections. Meanwhile, the JSP has completed its review of the loss in the Assembly polls and is now conducting another review aimed at reconstituting the party organisational units that were dissolved after the election results.

JSP Bihar state president and former diplomat Manoj Bharti told ETV Bharat that a team of 40 members visited every district to review the performance in the Assembly elections, and their findings have been bracketed into internal and external reasons.

“As far as the internal reasons are concerned, our organisation was not strong at the grassroots, the candidates were declared closer to the polls, leaving less time for them to campaign, and they should have been announced at least two-and-a-half months before the elections,” Bharti said.

“The external reasons include the bogey of ‘jungle raj’ (lawlessness or rule of the jungle) raised by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which misled people. The government blatantly violated the model code of conduct for polls, and the Election Commission (EC) turned a Nelson’s eye towards it,” Bharti added.

The JSP state president revealed that the party has filed a writ in the Supreme Court against the mistakes and irresponsibilities of the EC. Bharti pointed out that the party was now gearing up to constitute its units at the village and panchayat level, along with a membership drive across the state.

“We are right now in hibernation mode, but our team is finding out which members of our party are still active and who have left. We will reconstitute our party’s organisation after the report comes,” the JSP state president added.

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