A Congress panel has been tasked with discussing the Prashant Kishor plan
Whether poll strategist Prashant Kishor will join the Congress and what his role will be in the 2024 national election will be decided by party chief Sonia Gandhi, top leaders said today.
Sonia Gandhi consulted with senior Congress leaders last evening and will take a final call after discussions with her children Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, sources said.
After her talks with Priyanka Gandhi and senior party leaders, she also met with Prashant Kishor for the second time in three days. Rahul Gandhi was not part of the discussions.
"The final decision has been left to Sonia Gandhi who had already done the process of consultation earlier and will take a final call in consultation with Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi, among others, about his exact role and whether he will join the party or support the party's election strategy ahead of the assembly elections and Lok Sabha elections in 2024," a Congress leader added.
A Congress panel has been tasked with discussing the Prashant Kishor plan and getting back to Sonia Gandhi within a week.
The meetings will continue for the next few days and the party is expected to shortly announce its brainstorming session as well as Prashant Kishor's entry, the leader said.
Prashant Kishor, who has a spectacular track record of election victories with names like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on his CV, made a presentation before the Gandhis on Saturday.
Since then, a small group of leaders who have been part of the Congress war group have been sitting in Sonia Gandhi's conference room - without her or Prashant Kishore - looking at a discussion paper on various issues that need to be addressed urgently and taken up by the party in a brainstorming session planned next month.
Prashant Kishor's plan focuses on states where elections are due later this year and next - Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. The recommendations include WhatsApp groups at the booth level; communication teams; granular data analysis of the strengths and weakness of the party in each constituency, possible candidates and issues; and changing the narrative of communal polarisation to bread-and-butter issues affecting the people on a day-to-day basis, including high prices.
Prashant Kishor's engagement with the Congress has been a roller-coaster of secret meetings, public denials and baffling tweets.
Talks between the Gandhis and the strategists began last year, soon after PK's successful outing in Bengal, where Mamata Banerjee scored a mega victory.
But the talks fell through, reportedly over disagreements on the way forward, and sour tweets from Prashant Kishor targeting Rahul Gandhi confirmed the falling out.
The talks restarted last month after the Congress' latest election defeats, which raised questions about the party's survival.