New Delhi/Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress has extended its contract with election strategists I-PAC, or Indian Political Action Committee, to 2026 after a successful partnership saw Mamata Banerjee sweep the April-May Assembly polls and return as Chief Minister of Bengal for a third straight term, a private news channel reported.
This version of I-PAC, however, will not be led in day-to-day operations by master strategist Prashant Kishor, who guided the Trinamool (and, in Tamil Nadu, the DMK-Congress alliance) to victory over the BJP (and its southern ally, the AIADMK) and then revealed that he wanted to "quit". It will be interesting to see how well I-PAC and its new nine-member leadership team can function without Kishor, and how efficiently it can win elections for Trinamool and its other clients. The new contract says I-PAC will be involved in all state elections — Panchayats and the local body.
The contract extension will run till the next round of Assembly elections in Bengal, by which time key states, including UP, Gujarat and Karnataka, and the country would have also held elections.
It comes a little over a week after senior Trinamool leader Partha Chatterjee told reporters that the Trinamool is planning on "expanding the organisation outside Bengal".
The party's new general secretary Abhishek Banerjee made similar comments after his promotion; who was key in bringing Kishor on board to mastermind the Trinamool's Bengal campaign.
The contract also follows a meeting between Prashant Kishor and NCP chief Sharad Pawar in Mumbai last week.
There was speculation the meeting had a larger context — one related to the 2024 election and talk of an Opposition leader.
Backed by Kishor and the I-PAC, Mamata won 213 of 292 seats despite BJP's vitriolic campaign.
Over the past few months, she has been foremost among non-BJP leaders in calling for a united Opposition to take on the party in power at the Centre.
In March, she wrote to 10 key Opposition leaders, including interim Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, and suggested they join forces to take on the BJP after the April-May round of elections.
Ahead of the 2019 election too, she was one of those advocating a unified front to battle the BJP.