Odisha unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday claimed to have enrolled 30 lakh members in the State.
The party’s massive membership drive was carried out using different technological platforms wherein people could enrol by calling a toll-free number or logging on to their official website.
“At a time when party at national level has touched the magic figure of 10 crore, we have been successful in crossing 30-lakh mark. We have set a target to enrol 40 lakh members in Odisha,” said Pratap Sarangi, veteran party leader and joint in-charge of the membership drive.
Mr. Sarangi said, “there could be around 5 lakh other members who have sent SMS requests. We have not counted them as yet. If these members are added, we will surely cross 35 lakh. We are confident of touching 40-lakh mark by April 30.”
When told that leaders of opposition parties have found their names enrolled during BJP’s membership drive, he said, “other parties are jealous of BJP’s recent spectacular growth. They are bringing baseless allegations and spreading lies.”
“Anyway, we are launching the second part of the party's membership drive with the "mahasampark abhiyan" or door-to-door verification campaign after April 30. Workers would reach out to the new members. If anybody feels he or she had mistakenly given a miss call and become member, we would respect the request of deletion of name from the list,” Mr. Sarangi said.
At present, State BJP has 3 lakh registered members. About 30,000 workers would be deployed to do verification of enrolled members.
