The Congress has asked election strategist Prashant Kishor to join the party in a high level meeting at the residence of party president Sonia Gandhi. Apart from Prashant Kishor, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, senior Congress leaders Ambika Soni, Digvijiya Singh, Mallikarjun Kharge, Ajay Maken, KC Venugopal are attending the meeting. According to reports, the party is roping in Prashant Kishor in its big plan for the Gujarat assembly election. Kishor is part of the plan for projecting industrialist, Leuva Patidar leader Naresh Patel as the chief ministerial candidate.
Prashant Kishor, of late, has been critical of Congress leadership. During the Lakhimpur Kheri incident last year, when Priyanka Gandhi was detained on her way to Lakhimpur Kheri, Prashant Kishor tweeted there is no quick-fix solution to the "deep-rooted problems and structural weakness of GOP". There had been much talk in the party about Kishor’s involvement in election strategising. A section of the party wants him to be roped in for the Gujarat poll campaign, but he is said to be insisting on the induction of Naresh Patel, chairman of the Shree Khodaldham Trust which manages the grand temple of Goddess Khodiyar, the patron deity of the Leuva Patidar community near Rajkot. Some of the party leaders claim Kishor wants Patel to be projected as the party’s face in the Gujarat Assembly elections. While Kishor had, in the past, denied reports that he may join the party, a section of the leaders insist that it is not a closed chapter. Kishor had a series of meetings with the Gandhis last year too but his association with other parties has led a section of the leaders to oppose his entry citing the trust factor.