While the poll strategist Prashant Kishor has recently been in the spotlight, after he announced his decision to join Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United), on 16 September, the inner workings of his political advocacy group, the Indian Political Action Committee, has evaded public attention. Just four days after Kishor’s announcement, IPAC conducted a poll at its main office in Hyderabad, to determine the political party with which its employees were keen on campaigning for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. But according to a former and a current employee of IPAC, both of whom were present for and participated in the poll, the BJP was the chosen party despite an apparent consensus to work with the Congress.
Though the IPAC management is yet to officially announce to the staff that the advocacy group would be campaigning with the BJP, the two employees said the result had been manipulated to align with the party. “The way they conducted the poll was quite shabby,” the current employee said. “It was a sham. It was a way for the company to convince its employees—who already knew in their hearts of hearts that they would be working for the BJP.” The employee’s primary complaint was not that IPAC would be working for the BJP, but the manner in which the organisation made the announcement. “They could have done it better. They could have told the employees: ‘Listen guys, we are working for the BJP. You guys can be professional. This is what we got you here for.’”
The poll was preceded by a curious sequence of events that month. On 9 September, while interacting with students at the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad, Kishor declared that he will not be campaigning with anyone “in the manner and form” that he has been working in since the 2014 elections. The next day, IPAC’s management held an informal poll at the Golkonda Hotel in Hyderabad, asking employees to indicate, by show of hands, which party they would like to work for. According to the former employee, who was present at the hotel, an overwhelming number of people showed their support for the Congress.
COMMENT