‘Vote Chori’ didn’t resonate with voters, Congress nearly wiped out from Bihar

The Congress party has been nearly wiped out from Bihar, show the 2025 Assembly Election results declared on Friday. As of 4.20 pm, the Congress party is leading in just 4 seats out of the total 243 in the Bihar Legislative Assembly.

The results for the Grand Old Party show there were no takers for its ‘vote chori’ allegations.

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The Indian National Congress was a key pillar of the opposition Mahagathbandhan alliance, which was seeking to uproot the NDA from Bihar. Along with Tejashwi Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal, the national party was expected to bring change in Bihar. However, today’s trends so far show the people of Bihar have voted to remove the party from the state, where it once used to be a formidable force.

The Congress campaign in Bihar was spearheaded by its former president Rahul Gandhi, along with his sister Priyanka Gandhi – both Lok Sabha MPs. Rahul built his campaign around two pillars – ‘Voter Adhikar Yatra’ and the ‘Vote Chori’ allegations.

However, none of these appear to have made a mark for the Congress party in Bihar. In fact, the party has failed to even secure the seats it had won in the last elections in 2020, i.e. 27.

While it was believed that the twin issues, including the highly controversial SIR, could galvanise voter support for the Congress in the crucial Bihar elections, they appear to have failed to make any mark among the state’s voters. The voters appear to have chosen local issues over national ones while deciding the fate of the parties.

The Congress’s failure even became a burden for its major alliance partner, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). While the RJD too is leading on just 25 seats out of the total 243, it has still managed to bag the highest vote share among all parties – at over 22 per cent. The Congress, on the other hand, has just managed to secure over 8 per cent vote. Even the BJP and the JD(U)’s vote share is less than that of the RJD.

The NDA, meanwhile, has defied all expectations and is on course to secure a massive landslide in the Bihar elections. It is poised to win over 200 seats.

It may be recalled that the Congress last performed well under Jagannath Mishra, who served as the chief minister of Bihar in 1990. Since then, the party has been on a steady decline, culminating in the disastrous performance this year.