The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a petition by Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) seeking the annulment of the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections on the ground of violation of the model code of conduct (MCC) by the Nitish-Kumar-led NDA government.

The party alleged that the debt-ridden state government gave away ₹15,600 crore under the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana after the announcement of the poll schedule, which violated the MCC and denied a level playing field to other political parties.

However, the bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi pulled up Kishor for seeking to settle political scores in the court.

“How many votes did your party get? If people reject you, you approach the judicial forum to get publicity?” CJI Kant told senior advocate C.U. Singh, appearing for the JSP.

“How can you say all these things? You will do the same thing if you come to power,” Justice Bagchi interjected.

The JSP failed to open its account in the Bihar polls that returned the JDU-BJP combine to power with a massive mandate.

The bench said Kishor should ideally have challenged the government scheme last year. Even in his petition, he had not challenged the constitutionality or legality of the transfer of ₹10,000 each to 25-35 lakh women, the bench said.

Singh submitted that the state government distributed the money without any budgetary allocation.

The apex court said the party should have filed an election petition against the scheme and not a “composite petition” seeking quashing of the entire election process.