Bihar will be no exception. In fact, certain key actors are already on the job of marshalling Hindus. Prime Minister Narendra Modi need not split hair. Modi values his international image and he is completely aware that the global goal is dismantling Hinduism, has been dismantling Hinduism for ever since one can pull back in recent history. Modi’s studied indifference to Hinduism is broken only when there's an impending state election with a loss staring him in the face.

Then, the pseudo-secular Prime Minister, casts away his secular choga and turns into an incandescent Hindutva icon. The next target in the Sangh Parivar's crosshair is the Bihar elections. Perhaps the toughest, tougher than Haryana and Maharashtra. Bihar is where caste politics is entrenched. Bihar is open range for Rashtriya Janata Dal and Lalu Prasad Yadav is still the ultimate Muslim-Yadav social-engineer.

Caste politics is woven into the state’s political dna. Bihar Assembly elections 2025 will not escape the caste net, where parties like the RJD and the Congress can ignore caste only at their own peril. Even the Janata Dal (U) has to pander to caste politics. In these circumstances what does the Bharatiya Janata Party have if not the Hindu card? Like United States President Donald Trump told his Ukrainian counterpart, "You don't have the cards?"

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too, doesn't have the cards to win the Bihar assembly elections. He will have to rely on the 'Hindu-card'. The BJP can only challenge the status quo with toxic Hindutva. This isn't new to the BJP; the party had played the 'Hindu-card' in 2015, too. But then, Nitish Kumar's JD(U) wasn't with the BJP.

Then, in 2015, Janata Dal (U) aligned with the Tejashvi Yadav-led RJD. The question being asked, today, is when the BJP-JD(U) are together, why the 'Hindu Card'? The answer is the gap between uncertain victory and certain victory. The RSS is convinced Hindu consolidation will deliver victory to the BJP and even if Prime Minister does not acknowledge, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's 'Batenge toh katenge' is a vote-winner. The Sangh Parivar is fully in the Yogi's corner.

It doesn't matter how much Modi-friendly television news anchors continue to pitch the airwaves with Modi's 'Ek hai toh Safe hain'. The diehard among them are incorrigible Modi sycophants, shameless purveyors of the 'Modi-cult', their duty and their high salaries are to sell 'Modi-ism' to the hoi polloi, who are the ones who turnout on voting day, election after election.

And the Sangh Parivar works on the 80:20 formula, which today has become part of the BJP spokesperson's lexicon. "What's wrong, I will tell it straight. Yes, we work on the basis of 80:20. There is no shame in admitting, 80 percent Hindus against 20 percent Muslims?" said Dr. Ajay Alok, one of the several BJP spokespersons who brag they call a spade a spade.

Dr Ajay Alok is a physician from Bihar and he declares with convincing clarity that the BJP lives and breathes 'Hindutva'; that the Hindu card is that of the BJP for keeps. In fact, Dr Alok is always getting into altercations with his Shiv Sena (UBT) `counterpart on debates focusing on Hindutva and the Hindu card. The good doctor is not bothered if Prime Minister Narendra Modi is busy smiling at Muslim forums.

It is all part of the game. Ultimately, it will be the Hindu card though the credit for the poll victory will go to "Pradhan Mantri Narendra Modi". All BJP spokespersons are conditioned to singing praise of Prime Minister Modi, even the brightest among them, the ones who quote from quotable quotes and pull out data from indecipherable depths.

The Bharatiya Janata Party is not waiting for the Bihar elections to be announced or for the RJD or the Congress to start showing signs of stirring from their positions. The BJP's early birds have already hit the ground running. It is always the early bird which catches the worm and the early birds in Bihar on the BJP's side are 'Kathawachak' Baba Bageshwar, Art of Living guru Sri Sri Ravishankar and RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat.

The trio have been shaking up the Bihar electoral scene and stirring voters to wake up early to the impending assembly elections in Bihar and smell the bihari coffee. And each to his own, like the saying goes. Baba Bageshwar is the loudest of the trio, literally and audibly. He is also the one the opposition parties are most apprehensible about. Bageshwar says he is not in Bihar to take "sides" and that his only goal is to "unify the Hindus."

The Bihar Assembly elections will likely take place in October-November 2025. Baba Bageshwar will likely keep visiting Bihar again and again. This Hindu 'Dharamguru' is immensely popular among Hindus with the charisma to draw huge crowds, up to even 20 lakhs at one venue. Naturally, he is getting special attention from the RJD, which would rather do without "unifying Hindus."

But this is only the start, Bihar will be seeing a string of "Hindu Dharamgurus" visiting the poll-bound state in the months to come.

Politics is suddenly playing up in Bihar. People are calling it "siyasi hulchal". Baba Bageshwar Dhirendra Shastri toured Vaishali, Gopalganj and Banka in the "first phase", from March 6-10 holding large public meetings with the rhetoric rising to a crescendo wherever he pitched tent. Some of his public statements are definitely controversial but the Nitish Kumar-BJP government is friendly.

Earlier, from February 16-26 a 9-day 'Mahamrutnjaya Yagna' was performed at Patna's Gandhi Maidan by the BJP. Present at the event included former central minister CP Thakur, Member of Parliament Vivek Thakur and minister in the Nitish Kumar government Prem Kumar. If there were Hindu Dharamgurus, they weren't advertising themselves. But the event itself was "Hindu".

As for Mohan Bhagwat, he was in Bihar on March 7, fuelling the RSS' "cultural nationalism." The RSS Chief has been an "active politician" ever since the Haryana elections were announced and held. And the RSS made sure voters turned out in large numbers for the BJP in Haryana, Maharashtra and even in Delhi, where assembly elections returned the BJP to power after 27 years.

The RSS political modus operandi is to hold "small meetings" with groups of voters. In Maharashtra alone, the RSS operatives held as many as 70,000 "nukkad meetings" with voters. Even otherwise, the language of the Maharashtra assembly elections was "Hindutva" with the RSS and Devendra Fadnavis taking charge of the poll campaign in the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

For once, Prime Minister Modi's divisive "Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas" slogan wasn't given free-run in Haryana and Haryana was added to the BJP kitty thanks to Yogi Adityanath's four-to-five "Batenge toh katenge" rallies in the state, where the Dalit vote-bank took a clearly demarcated 'Hindutva line', teaming up with other non-Jat voters except the Muslim voters.

Maharashtra also voted overwhelmingly on the Hindu and Hindutva line and if anybody is saying Prime Minister Narendra Modi won Delhi for the BJP, that was a stray statement. Delhi, too, voted Hindutva and more so with the Mahakumbh in full flow. The lesson learned, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among the first in Bihar, talking about Mahakumbh and Hindu consolidation before setting out to appease the Sufi Muslim in Ajmer Sharif.

Be sure, the Prime Minister will be back in Bihar again and again to cash in on Hindu sentiments, his only ticket to cling on to power despite all the talk of "Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas'. Make no mistake, the Bihar polls will be won or lost on how many vote caste and how many vote Hindu. The Muslim vote is no longer the ace. Ask Sri Sri Ravishankar, he knows the 'Art of Voting' pretty well after his visit to Bihar. (IPA Service)