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Nitish Kumar holds all the cards: What NDA sweep in Bihar election 2025 means as JD(U) roars ‘tiger zinda hai’
In one stroke, the Bihar CM has fixed his principal rival in the state, the RJD, and has cautioned his NDA allies, including BJP, not to take him for granted
The conventional political wisdom about Nitish Kumar in Bihar — of managing friends and foe alike — appears to be coming home with a vengeance not many had anticipated.
Early trends in results for the Bihar election 2025 suggested that the state's longest serving chief minister is all set to further extend his tenure to a ninth term. On August 10, 2022, he was sworn in as the chief minister of the state for the eighth time in 22 years.
As the trends streamed in, it became clear that Nitish Kumar may have killed two birds with one stone. His improved performance consolidates his position within the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), vis-a-vis the senior partner BJP. Two, his victory at home ensures that his principal rival in Bihar, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), has been fixed nice and proper.
No one in his place could ask for more.
Many wins for Nitish within NDA victory
"I knew that the NDA always had the edge, but no one could have predicted this Nitish avalanche,” said NK Chowdhary, a political analyst.
“This has several lessons for everyone. The good governance by Nitish has paid off. The BJP, which was reluctant to name him as the NDA's chief ministerial candidate for 2025, has been told by the Bihar electorate that they could not push around their leader.”
Nitish, who has changed parties and alliances often, is not the one to be shaded, if an ally turns recalcitrant.
Over the last two decades that he has been chief minister, the JD(U) supremo has developed a reputation for good governance, earning the moniker of “sushasan babu” (roughly translates to “master of good governace”).
On the eve of the election, an analysis of socio-economic indicators, from the start of his first term as CM in 2005 to now, showed how far Bihar has come under Nitish.
Data beyond seats that spurred Nitish's success
On a range of indicators in the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), from 2005-06 to 2019-21 (the latest available data), Bihar improved at a faster rate than the national average under Nitish, drawing the state much closer to pan-Indian living standards than when he took over.
According to the NFHS data, by 2019-21, Bihar had almost caught up with the national average in household electrification: 96 per cent of households in the state reported electricity as their main source of lighting, compared to 97 per cent across India.
What Nitish & Bihar mean for Modi's Centre now
That Nitish Kumar’s stock with ally BJP is set to reach a higher level is also obvious.
The JD(U)’s 12 MPs support PM Narendra Modi’s coalition NDA government in Delhi, whose importance is set to be magnified with the coalition consolidating its position in the state, and by extension with the Centre.
Says Rahul Verma, Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR): “There is no doubt that Nitish Kumar has emerged stronger. He has the numbers in Bihar, unlike last time; and offers crucial support to the NDA government at the centre. He is now in the elite company of former chief ministers like Jyoti Basu and Naveen Patnaik. Nitish can now leave a legacy in his home state.”
Could his bargaining chip with the BJP improve, considering that the senior partner BJP appeared reluctant to name him as the chief minister after the elections?
According to Verma, these are things that may come up later, but for the moment there is no doubt that Nitish is sitting pretty.
What future holds for Nitish Kumar
In his mid-seventies, Nitish Kumar emerged from the Jayaprakash Narayan (JP) Movement of the 1970s, a breeding ground for many socialist leaders of his generation, including RJD founder Lalu Prasad Yadav.
He entered electoral politics in the early 1980s, winning his first assembly election from Harnaut in 1985, and later serving as a member of Parliament for Barh and Nalanda.
The Bihar chief minister continues to dominate the state's political narrative. Whether leading the NDA or aligning with the Opposition, every move he makes reshapes Bihar's electoral landscape.
Since 2006, he has been a member of the Bihar legislative council (MLC), choosing not to contest assembly elections directly, a rare move for a sitting chief minister to remain in the Upper House.
Nitish Kumar’s chutzpah lies in the fact that he has changed his allies as he deems fit, marked by frequent yet calculated alliances and breakups. He parted ways with the BJP in 2013 after Narendra Modi’s emergence as the party’s national face, only to ally with Lalu Prasad Yadav’s RJD and the Congress for the 2015 election, forming the Mahagathbandhan.
He returned to the NDA fold a couple of years later, and won again in 2020. Then came a blip back to the MGB, but then he was back to the NDA.
In doing so, he has taken descriptions of him like “opportunist", “survivor” and “time server” with a smile and a mountain of salt. More smiles than salt now.
