Prashant Kishor says no to joining Congress with ‘defined responsibility’

After a lot of speculation, meetings and deliberations, poll strategist Prashant Kishor cleared the air on his entry into the Congress when he categorically rejected the offer to join the party as part of its “Empowered Action Group”.

Kishor’s refusal ends months of uncertainty over his grand plans to rejuvenate the grand old party. On reasons why Kishor refused the offer, sources within the party said the poll strategist wasn’t given a free hand to implement the changes he wanted.

“I declined the generous offer of #congress to join the party as part of the EAG & take responsibility for the elections. In my humble opinion, more than me the party needs leadership and collective will to fix the deep rooted structural problems through transformational reforms,” Kishor tweeted on Tuesday (April 26) after the party offered him a position in the Empowered Action Group.

“Following a presentation & discussions with Sh. Prashant Kishor, Congress President has constituted a Empowered Action Group 2024 & invited him to join the party as part of the group with defined responsibility. He declined. We appreciate his efforts & suggestion given to party,” Congress leader Randeep Surjewala tweeted.

Also read: Non-Gandhi party chief among Prashant Kishor’s ‘reincarnation’ plan for Cong

The Congress on Monday (April 25) announced that an “Empowered Action Group-2024” will be constituted to address the political challenges ahead and a ‘Chintan Shivir’ will be organised in Rajasthan’s Udaipur from May 13-15 to deliberate on organisational restructuring and other issues to strengthen the party.

Kishor, during one of his meetings with Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her children Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, made five strategic suggestions for the revival of the party.

Among the suggestions were fixing the leadership issue and reclaiming the party’s founding tenets. The other proposals included solving the issue of alliances, strengthening the party at grassroots through cadres, and creating better media and social media reach.

Kishor had proposed a “democratisation” of the Congress for its revival.