PATNA: Prashant Kishor, a former political planner who is now an activist, announced on Wednesday the start of his political group, the Jan Suraaj Party. This was a big deal because Kishor wants to change the way politics work in Bihar.

A lot of well-known people, like former Union minister Devendra Prasad Yadav, diplomat-turned-politician Pavan Varma, and ex-MP Monazir Hassan, were there to start the party at the Veterinary College Ground in the state capital.

The party was created exactly two years after Kishor started his more than 3,000-km “padayatra” of the state, starting in Champaran, where Mahatma Gandhi led the first Satyagraha in the country. He did this to try to get people to support a “new political alternative” that would help Bihar get out of its long-term state of laggardliness.