Former Bihar minister joins PK's Jan Suraaj Party

Hajipur (Bihar): Former Bihar minister Brishin Patel on Sunday disclosed that he has joined the Jan Suraaj Party founded by former election strategist Prashant Kishor.

Patel was talking to reporters in his native district of Vaishali, a day after he met Kishor and became a member of the newly floated outfit.

A former close aide of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Patel has represented the Vaishali assembly segment several times besides having been once elected to the Lok Sabha from Siwan.

Hailing from a family of freedom fighters, Patel was once considered the second most powerful Kurmi leader in the state after Nitish Kumar.

After Kumar became the Chief Minister in 2005, Patel, who was then in the JD(U), got inducted into the state cabinet.

However, he burnt his bridges with the party supremo in 2015 when he sided with outgoing chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi and joined Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM).

Ahead of the 2020 assembly polls, which saw a tie-up between Manjhi and Kumar, Patel quit the NDA and joined the RJD.