Popular political strategist Sunil Kanugolu, who was reportedly hired by Telugu Desam Party president and former Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, is said to have got a bigger assignment.
According to reports in a section of media, Sunil has reportedly been hired by Congress president Rahul Gandhi for working out a nation-wide strategy for the party to win the next Lok Sabha elections.
Definitely, it would be a bigger opportunity for Sunil. If he succeeds to turn around the fate of the Congress in the next elections, it will fetch him a huge mileage and his image will go up bigger than Prashant Kishor, his erstwhile colleague.
If Sunil takes up the assignment for the Congress party, he might not find time to work for the TDP in Andhra Pradesh, as it will be a tough task for him to handle both the jobs.
Though it is not exactly known whether he has already signed an agreement with the TDP. If he hasn’t yet, he might not take up the job. If he has already entered into an agreement with Naidu, he might have to dump his party.
There is also a possibility that his team might be working for the TDP without Sunil being directly involved. But one doesn’t know whether Naidu will agree for this part time arrangement.
In fact, the TDP president had earlier hired another political strategist Robin Sharma of Showtime Consulting Services and a former colleague of Prashant Kishor in I-PAC. But, he terminated the contract with Sharma, as he did not live up to the expectations of Naidu and his strategies reportedly failed in the by-election to Tirupati parliamentary seat.
Sunil, a former consultant with McKinsey, was also an associate of Prashant Kishor in 2014, before the launch of I-PAC and both of them had worked for the victory of Narendra Modi in 2014 general elections. Later, both parted ways.
Sunil worked for DMK in Tamil Nadu assembly elections in 2016 and played a key role in boosting the image of M K Stalin, though his party lost the elections by narrow margin. On the other hand, Prashant Kishor worked for Nitish Kumar in Bihar.
In 2016, Sunil was engaged by Amit Shah, who was then heading the BJP to lead the party’s war room in the name of Association of Billion Minds (ABM).
He played a major role in the BJP's victory in Uttar Pradesh, Uttrakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat and Karnataka elections.
Between 2018 and 2019, Sunil again worked for the DMK and helped the party win 39 out of 40 Lok Sabha seats in 2019 general elections.
When Stalin chose Prashant Kishor as the strategist for assembly elections in 2021, Sunil moved to AIADMK but failed to secure a victory for the party.
