T he narrative around migration and migrants is one of the core discussion points of the 2025 Bihar elections. Criticism of the ongoing migration from Bihar is a strategic slogan in the rallies, speeches and TV interviews of Opposition political parties such as the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Congress and the Prashant Kishor-led Jan Suraaj Party.

They represent Bihari migration as distressed migration and described it as a ‘ palayan ’ (escape, displacement etc). The media also repeats similar narratives.

Their understanding of Bihari migration is based on inputs and insights developed through the old, conventional and simplistic understanding of the life of Bihari migrants. It emerges from the theoretical optics of structuralism and neo-Marxism, which are based on the arguments of ‘developm

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