Kishor has worked as a political strategist for many Indian political parties helping them win elections. It is said that he has been a Kingmaker, ensuring the victory of six chief ministers within six years of his work. He started his work with the BJP in 2011. Kishor worked reportedly
pro bono, and without holding any office in the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) or
Gujarat Government, Kishor worked as a
political strategist for BJP's pre-election campaign in
2012 Gujarat Legislative Assembly election and
2014 Lok Sabha election. In 2013, Kishor co-founded Citizens for Accountable Governance (CAG), a media and publicity company in preparation for the May 2014 general election of India, with Robbin Sharrma and others. Kishor and his team were credited with formulating an innovative marketing and advertising campaign for Narendra Modi— the
Chai Pe Charcha discussions, 3D rallies, Run for Unity, Manthan and several social media programmes. In 2015, he helped
Nitish Kumar led
Mahagathbandhan win the
2015 Bihar Legislative Assembly election. Kishor Joined the
Janata Dal (United) on 16 September 2018 as the vice-president of the party. Kishor and other CAG members regrouped as I-PAC to work with Nitish Kumar, in a bid to win a third term as chief minister in the Bihar Legislative Assembly election. The claims were that Kishor dramatically influenced the strategy, resources and alliances for the campaign. Upon winning the Bihar elections, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar named Kishor as his advisor for planning and programme implementation, with a brief look for ways to implement the seven-point agenda that was promised during Kumar's election campaign. In 2020, Kishor was involved with the
2020 Bihar Legislative Assembly election. In 2016 the
Indian National Congress employed Kishor for the
2017 Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly election. However, these elections were a failure for Congress and Kishor as BJP won more than 300 seats and Congress could only manage seven seats. This was also the first and only time Kishor failed to help a party win the elections. Kishor has successfully worked with several other political parties in India as well including
Amarinder Singh for the
2017 Punjab Legislative Assembly election,
Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy for the
2019 Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly election,
Arvind Kejriwal for the
2020 Delhi Legislative Assembly election,
Mamata Banerjee for the
2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election, and
M. K. Stalin for the
2021 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election as well.
Retirement After the win of the
AITC in the 2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election and DMK in the 2021 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election, Kishor declared that he was quitting as an election strategist. In an interview with
NDTV on 2 May 2021, Kishor told anchor
Sreenivasan Jain on live TV, "I do not want to continue what I am doing. I have done enough. Time for me to take a break and do something else in life. I want to quit this space." == Personal life ==