Buoyed by Assembly poll success, BJP eyeing all 29 LS seats in MP

BHOPAL: A little over two months after the BJP registered a landslide victory in the Assembly elections to retain power in Madhya Pradesh, the party has launched two separate campaigns -- ‘Wall Writing’ and ‘Gaon Chalo Abhiyan’ -- with an eye on bagging all the 29 Lok Sabha seats in the state in the upcoming general elections by tapping the 'key voters'.

In the last two general elections in 2014 and 2019, the BJP had almost made a clean sweep by winning 27 and 28 seats, respectively. In the November 17 Assembly elections, the results for which were announced on December 3, the party had bagged 163 out the 230 seats on offer.

Looking confident to repeat its successful electoral performance, the BJP has begun preparations for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections with some concrete plans that it intends to execute on the ground.

Though its ‘Wall Writing' initiative, BJP leaders will try their hands on creating party symbol (lotus) and catchy slogans for the upcoming general elections such as ‘Ek Bar Fir Modi Sarkar’, while the ‘Gaon Chalo Abhiyan’ is a relatively more grounded one.

As part of the Wall Writing campaign, leaders who are not used to holding a brush would write slogans on a design made by someone else. However, the Gaon Chalo Abhiyan is a multi-layered concept under which the BJP leaders would have to spend hours in the villages among people.

The idea behind Gaon Chalo Abhiyan is to aid the new voters under BJP's ‘key voters’ programme. This campaign is being run in some specific rural areas where the BJP’s performance has been relatively weak in the recent polls, both in Assembly and general elections.

Senior BJP leader Narottam Mishra, who has been visiting villages in the Sagar region to execute the party’s plans for the last few days, said the ‘key voters’ programme is also aimed at connecting the influential people with the party.

Mishra, a former Home Minister of Madhya Pradesh who has been appointed party in-charge for the Sagar Lok Sabha cluster, told IANS, “Earlier, our last layer at the booth level used be 'panna pramukh' and 'ardh-panna praukh’. But with the ‘key voter’ concept, we are trying to find out some selected people who were left untouched and bring them within the party fold.”

He added that under this plan, the BJP leaders would organise different types of programmes involving the villagers. Further, the party would identify some influential people in the villages and bring them into the party fold by awarding them for their past achievements.

“These people can be from varied sections like retired government officials, women associated with social service, local artists, students, farmers and those who have a good reputation in their respective villages.

"The booth-level workers have been tasked with identifying such people and prepare a list. When a prominent leader visits these areas, the selected people will be invited and awarded,” Mishra told IANS.