The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a petition filed by former political strategist Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj party challenging the conduct of the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections, Live Law reported.
The petition had alleged that the state government misused a cash transfer scheme ahead of voting to influence voters. It had sought fresh elections in the state.
A bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi on Friday criticised the party for approaching the court after losing the elections.
“How many votes did you get,” Live Law quoted the bench as asking. “Once people reject you, you use the judicial forum to get relief! Somebody should have challenged the scheme itself then. That is not the prayer before us. You just want the election to be declared null and void.”
The National Democratic Alliance had bagged 202 of the state’s 243 Assembly seats on November 14, while the Opposition Mahagathbandhan won 35 seats. The Jan Suraaj had failed to win any seat despite fielding candidates in 238 constituencies.
Ahead of the polls, the state government had on October 3 transferred Rs 10,000 each to the bank accounts of women residents under the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana. The scheme aims to support one woman in each family to start a small business.
At the time, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had said that financial assistance to the remaining women would be transferred on October 8. The payment was among a series of welfare measures announced by Kumar in the run-up to the elections.
This came despite the Election Commission announcing the schedule for the Assembly elections in the state on October 6, when the Model Code of Conduct came into force.
The code is a set of guidelines issued by the poll panel that political parties, candidates and governments must follow during an election. It sets guardrails for speeches, campaigning, meetings, processions, election manifestos and other aspects of the polls.
The Jan Suraaj had approached the Supreme Court alleging that the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana violated the Model Code of Conduct.
In its petition, the party said that the cash transfer scheme was linked to the membership of JEEVIKA, a network of women’s self-help groups in the state. It claimed that while about one crore women had been associated with the JEEVIKA network ahead of the Mode Code of Conduct coming into force, around 1.5 crore women eventually received the payments as per media reports.
These new beneficiaries were added and received the cash transfer when the code was in force, the petition claimed, adding that this amounted to “corrupt practices” that were meant to influence voters.
On Friday, the Supreme Court told the Jan Suraaj party that the High Court was the appropriate forum as the petition only pertained to one state.
“In some cases, there is a serious issue of freebies which we will seriously examine,” Bar and Bench quoted the bench as saying while dismissing the petition.
The Supreme Court also said that while it would consider the matter of alleged freebies, it could not do so “at the behest of a party which has just lost”.
Social welfare schemes such as free public transport and concessions in electricity bills are referred to as “freebies” by some.
Also read: Why Nitish Kumar’s Rs 10,000 scheme is not swaying women voters in Bihar
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