Poll guru Prashant Kishor not coming to Kerala

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: CPM is not keen to employ an election strategist or a management agency to bolster its prospects in the forthcoming Assembly elections.

CPM politburo member M. A. Baby said that employing poll strategists to plan campaigns could have a marginal impact on election outcome.

But that also depended on the overall election scenario, he said responding to DC query on whether his party would rope in a strategist like Prashant Kishor, who played a key role in the massive victories of Narendra Modi and Nitish Kumar.

“We have a well-entrenched organisational mechanism to gauge the situation from grassroots level, manage election machinery and campaign,” he added.

There were reports that political parties from Kerala were queuing up at Mr Kishor’s doorsteps to rope him as their election strategist. “I don’t have any project in Kerala now. I don’t want to discuss about who approached me,” Mr Kishor told DC.

Mr Kishor, who heads the Indian Political Action Committee, was the strategist in Nitish Kumar’s landslide victory in the Bihar polls. His team, comprising hundreds of workers, was divided into various groups and they fanned out in Bihar to spread the message.

“His team is capable of operating like commandos who can carry out surgical operations deep inside the enemy territory. He is never panicked or over awed by opponents. And that is his USP,” said Manish Kumar, executive editor of NDTV India, who knows Bihar like back of his hand.

Sources close to Mr Kishor said the poll guru was not keen on elections this year as he wanted to write a book.

The Congress is reportedly trying to bring him on board for the 2017 Uttar Pradesh polls.