Meeting leaders won't help, need a 'credible face' for 2024 Lok Sabha polls: Prashant Kishor tells Nitish Kumar

Poll strategist Prashant Kishor also said that meeting leaders of various political parties "would not make much of a difference".

New Delhi: As Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar met several opposition leaders in the past few days, poll strategist Prashant Kishor on Saturday (September 10, 2022) said that there is a need for a "credible face" and mass movement to seek people's vote in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Kishor, who was earlier given the post of national president in Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (United) and was later expelled from the party, opined that meeting leaders of various political parties "would not make much of a difference".

"Such meetings and discussions taking place will not change the political situation on the ground. I do not have such an experience. He (Nitish Kumar) is more experienced than me. But I do not see the meeting of some leaders individually or collectively, holding discussions or press conferences, as an Opposition unity or a political development," Kishor told news agency ANI.

"Unless you create a people's movement and generate a popular narrative, form a formidable entity, and a credible face that can make the public believe that he can be a better alternative to the BJP, only then they (people) will vote for you," he said.

On Kumar holding a series of meetings including with Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao in Patna and with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in Delhi, Kishor said that such meetings would not make "much of a difference".

"When he (Nitish Kumar) was with the BJP, he met the leaders who were with them. Now he is no more with the BJP, so he is meeting the parties and leaders who are in opposition of the BJP. That would not make much of a difference. You need a credible narrative, people's trust, workers on the ground, and a trustworthy face and people's movement for doing it," he said.

He noted that there is discontent among the public in Bihar even after Nitish Kumar parted ways with the BJP last month to rejoin the Mahagathbandhan, and said that this would be "reflected in the next elections".

"I see there are two sections in public. One which is furious and the other which is sad. I don`t see a big chunk of society where there is excitement about the work being done by the state government. Wherever I go, I find people complaining. The complaints that I hear about every day are bureaucracy and corruption. I don`t think the people are happy and that would be reflected in the next elections," Kishor said.

The poll strategist predicted that the current formation which consists of seven political parties including Congress, Lalu Prasad Yadav`s RJD, JD(U) and the Left parties, will not remain the same in the next assembly elections.

"The next assembly elections will not be held in this formation where there are seven parties on one side and there is BJP on the other. A lot of changes are due in it," he told ANI.

Who can be a better face of Opposition among Mamata Banerjee, Arvind Kejriwal and KCR?

When asked who can be a better face of the Opposition among leaders such as Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee, Aami Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal and Telangana Rashtra Samithi president K Chandrashekar Rao, Prashant Kisor said that the right one is the one who can unite everyone and is acceptable to all.

Congress' Bharat Jodo Yatra should have covered states where BJP is strong political force

On Congress holding its 'Bharat Jodo Yatra', Prashant Kishor said that its focus is "disproportionately more in those states where the BJP is not a big political power." He suggested that the yatra should have mostly covered the states where the BJP is a strong political force.

"Looking at the route of the yatra, it seems that its aim is to unite the people or political activists against the work being done by the BJP or its ideology. The center of the yatra should have been those states where the BJP is strong. The yatra is being carried out mostly in those states where the BJP is not a very strong political force. The focus of the yatra is disproportionately in those states where the BJP is not a big social and political power. I find there is a contradiction with the said aim of the yatra," he said.

(With agency inputs)