Prashant Kishor registers himself as voter from crucial Bhabanipur seat

Political strategist Prashant Kishor, who helped Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamool Congress party retain power in the West Bengal Assembly polls earlier this year, has registered himself as a voter from the key Bhabanipur constituency.

The Bhabanipur seat is from where chief minister Banerjee plans to contest the bypoll this Thursday to enter the Assembly. She will be up against BJP’s Priyanka Tibrewal.

Kishor was earlier a voter from Bihar’s Sasaram district.

“He made the shift in view of apprehensions that the BJP might attempt to coerce the Election Commission to get him out of Kolkata amid the Assembly elections,” a report in NDTV quoted sources as saying. “With him camping in Kolkata as campaigner, the BJP could go to the Election Commission to complain and ask how he continues to stay on as polling was spread across several phases even in individual districts.”

On Kishor’s change of constituency, BJP media cell in-charge Saptarshi Choudhury tweeted in Bengali: “At last Prashant Kishor becomes the voter of Bhabanipur. So, we are not sure if the daughter of Bengal is now in favour of a bahiragato (outsider) voter.”

Kishor has reportedly provided his “care of” address as that of Trinamool leader and CM’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee, with whom he used to stay during the Covid lockdown. The Election Commission website says Kishor registered as a voter himself between January and April.

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