Prashant Kishor is polishing up Rahul Gandhi, Congress

The celebrated strategist, Prashant Kishor, is a man doing the unenviable task of making both ends meet, figuratively. First as strategist of Narendra Modi, he e-launched the Gujarat Chief Minister into the Prime Minister, and showed his rival, Rahul Gandhi, as Pappu. Now he is polishing up Rahul to be the Prime Minister. Having met Rahul Gandhi to craft the Congress strategy in UP, Prashant's task on hand is to re-project the Congress vice-president as a capable leader who can lead the party revival. Tough task indeed, considering there are too many heavyweights in UP such as Mulayam Singh, his son, Akhilesh Yadav, Bahujan Samaj leader Mayawati and so on. The Rahul Gandhi make-over has already begun, it appears. In the past few months, Rahul has stepped up his engagement with young people in universities. He visited Hyderabad immediately after Rohith Vemula’s suicide. And he visited Jawaharlal Nehru University a few days after the arrest of Kanhaiya Kumar – to express solidarity with the struggle of the students against the crackdown and charges of sedition. It was a dangerous mission, no doubt, because if the BJP had used it well, the result would have gone either way. Now, Rahul is established as a youth and student leader, whatever be the worth or nature of their views. There were many in the Congress not comfortable with it – NSUI, the student outfit. It felt, given that Kanhaiya was a Left student leader, the party had little to gain from making him a hero. Others felt the BJP’s attempt to project Rahul as supporting ‘anti-nationals’ may work in the Hindi heartland – and so he should have been more cautious. But Gandhi’s support for the JNU students stayed firm. On Wednesday, in his parliamentary speech, Rahul spoke about the national flag not as a piece of cloth but of relationships and conversations, introducing a new idea of nationalism in the current debate. Rahul has made interventions in the past too, on issues ranging from Dalit welfare to tribal rights. It was more in the nature of guest appearances. His interest appears sporadic; he does not seem to have the political stamina to stay on. He suddenly goes on a sabbatical, kept top secret by the party. Whether this fundamental element of his personality has changed or not is yet to be seen. It is too early to judge Prashant Kishor’s impact on Rahul’s politics. He has only this week come on board to help the Congress win elections, and rebrand the Congress leader. Party sources, however, suggest he had been having informal conversations with Rahul for a few months now, and has been passing on inputs. Whether the Rahul Gandhi of 2019 can be a radical departure from Rahul Gandhi of 2014 is the big question? Kishor has his task cut out.