The Bharatiya Janata Party has roped in college-goers who identify with the ‘Modi vision’ and the ‘Modi development model’ to drum up support for the ‘Modi for PM’ campaign.
Designated as ‘campus ambassadors,’ these students, especially in professional colleges, are being groomed to motivate their peers to support Mr. Modi’s candidature. So far, the party has identified a little over 10,000 campus ambassadors from 2,730 academic institutions across 537 districts, who have been coached to communicate the party’s line to their peers. These campus ambassadors are in addition to the members of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, who are slogging it out for the party’s campaign.
“We are focusing on engineering, medical and management colleges and those institutions where the ABVP is not present. We invite the youth to sign up for the campus ambassador programme and then coach them individually and in groups on how to motivate their friends and colleagues to vote for the party and Mr. Modi,” said Dinesh Pratap Singh, national media in-charge of the BJP’s Yuva Morcha.
“The ambassadors will speak about the ethics, ideology and schemes of the BJP and initiate ‘Modi Café’ by February 10 in their respective campuses, where discussions will be held about Mr. Modi’s agenda and policies.”.
The Yuva Morcha’s national president and MP Anurag Thakur claims the campus ambassador program — which has the highest enrolment in Uttar Pradesh, followed by Gujarat — has received a positive response even from States that are not considered a stronghold.
He cites the examples of West Bengal, which has 234 ambassadors, and Tamil Nadu, where 239 ambassadors have signed up. The organisation is hopeful that the 10,220 ambassadors who have signed up so far will be able to translate their support into votes that run into “several lakhs.”
