A key Bihar BJP leader has found common cause with Jan Suraaj founder Prashant Kishor, causing discomfort to the ruling NDA in the run up to the Assembly elections later this year.

Former Union power minister R.K. Singh has also asked Bihar deputy chief minister Samrat Chaudhary and BJP state president Dilip Jaiswal to “step down” if they fail to come clean on the charges levelled against them by Kishor, whose entry into the poll arena has added a third dimension to the sweepstakes in Bihar where power has swivelled between Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad for close to foure decades.

Poll strategist turned politician Kishor has been levelling serious corruption allegations against some BJP and JDU leaders.

"I stick to whatever I have said. Some serious charges have been levelled against these leaders, besides state BJP president Dilip Jaiswal. All these things are bringing a bad name to the party and the government. If they have evidence to dispute the allegations, they should come forward with it and may even sue Prashant Kishor for defamation. If not, they should step down,” Singh told PTI on Tuesday, as the BJP maintained a studied silence.

PK, as the Jan Suraaj founder is popularly known, has alleged that Chaudhary is not even a matriculate but claims to be a DLitt from California University. He has also alleged that Chaudhary had used a fake birth certificate to get out of jail in an attempt-to-murder case. He has further claimed that Chaudhary's original name is Rakesh Kumar, which was changed to Samrat Kumar Maurya and then to Samrat Chaudhary.

The Jan Suraaj leader has targeted two other BJP leaders — state president Jaiswal and health minister Mangal Pandey. He has accused Jaiswal of usurping a minority medical college through illegal means and Pandey of indulging in corruption as a minister. Kishor has claimed to have documentary evidence and even filed petitions in Patna High Court.

Commenting specifically on the allegations levelled against Chaudhary, the former Union minister said: "Samrat Chaudhary must show his degrees to the people. He must explain it with evidence. What is the problem in showing matriculation and graduation degrees?”

He added that other ministers facing allegations should also come clean, stressing that their silence was giving a bad name to the BJP. “Bihar BJP chief Dilip Jaiswal should also clarify. PK has claimed documentary proof that the medical college he runs near Kishanganj had been illegally taken over,” Singh told reporters in Patna, claiming that the allegations against the party leaders would harm the electoral prospects of the BJP.

Chaudhary is the BJP’s key OBC face in the state. The party’s central leadership, led by home minister Amit Shah, has been trying to project him as a prospective chief ministerial face. Chaudhary belongs to the Kushwaha caste, and the BJP is banking on him for the votes of the community.

Officially, the BJP maintained silence, but privately some leaders slammed Singh for trying to spoil the party’s prospects out of “frustration over his defeat in the last Lok Sabha polls”.

Singh, a former home secretary and Bihar-cadre IAS officer, had joined the BJP ahead of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls after retirement. He won the Arrah Lok Sabha seat twice and was the power minister in the last Modi government. He, however, lost the 2024 polls and, since then, has been pushed to the margins.