'Old wine...Old friends best': Navjot Sidhu meets Prashant Kishor after latter declines Congress offer

The cricket-turned-politician posted an image of himself with Kishor, captioning it "Had a wonderful meeting with my old friend PK... Old wine , Old gold and Old friends still the best !!!".

According to reports, the duo met in Delhi.

Sidhu had earlier spoken of his multiple meetings with Kishor, which played a major role in getting him to join the Congress while crafting the party's campaign ahead of the 2017 assembly elections in Punjab. 

"Prashant Kishor met me at least 60 times asking me to join the Congress," he told NDTV.

"PK said the Congress won't get over 30-35 seats. If you (Sidhu) come, there will be a swing of 7-8 per cent," he had said.

Earlier in the evening, putting at rest months of speculation, Kishor in a tweet said, "I declined the generous offer of Congress to join the party as part of the EAG and take responsibility for the elections."

"In my humble opinion, more than me the party needs leadership and collective will to fix the deep rooted structural problems through transformational reforms," he said.

Congress Chief Spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala also announced that Kishor has declined the offer.

"Following a presentation and discussions with Sh. Prashant Kishor, Congress President has constituted a Empowered Action Group 2024 and invited him to join the party as part of the group with defined responsibility. He declined, " Surjewala said.

"We appreciate his efforts and suggestion given to party," he said.

Kishor held three meetings with Sonia Gandhi and other Congress leaders over the last couple of weeks and made a detailed presentation on the roadmap for the party.

The Congress president constituted a committee which included P Chidambaram, Ambika Soni, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Digvijaya Singh, Jairam Ramesh, Mukul Wasnik, KC Venugopal, and Randeep Singh Surjewala to look into the suggestions made by Kishor.

The committee submitted its report on April 21.

According to reports, reservations were expressed by some Congress leaders over Kishor joining the party while his organisation iPAC consults parties like Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and Trinamool Congress which are Congress' rivals in their respective states.

On Monday, the party's chief spokesperson Surjewala announced that an 'Empowered Action Group - 2024' will be constituted to "address the political challenges ahead".