From arranging sports competitions to yatras, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has set a packed agenda for the next three months as part of its public outreach campaign, kicking off preparations for the 2019 general and Assembly elections.
The Hindu had on October 11 carried a report on the State Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha’s CM’s Cup initiative in all 288 Assembly constituencies for 75 days, starting from October 30.
“Apart from this, we are focusing on community based initiatives as well. Several yatras have been planned to address specific issues of the community and all MLAs and MPs have been directed to initiate works in this regard,” said a senior State BJP functionary.
From November 26 to December 6, the party’s Scheduled Caste cell has organised a yatra starting from Deekshabhoomi in Nagpur to Chaityabhoomi in Mumbai.
“The yatra will travel from areas where SC votes decide the fate of the election. We will address their issues, take government schemes to them and spread awareness about the schemes directed at the community,” said the leader.
From November 1 to 30, the party’s Scheduled Tribe cell will be launching a Birsa Munda Gaurav Yatra in Maharashtra’s ST dominated areas. “BJP has been defamed by the Opposition as an anti-SC/ST party. We want to address this and re-energise our workers in these regions through these intiatives,” he said.
150 km padyatra
BJP will also organise 150 kilometer-long padyatra in the 288 Assembly constituencies, marking the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. One of the important initiatives the party has undertaken is to appoint a panna pramukh — a person assigned to one page of the voters’ list, who will be responsible for maintaining contact with all the people on that page. Once appointed, all these panna pramukhs will be called for a special seminar for training by the party’s higher ups.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in his address to the party at a function in Mumbai last month said, “There are around two crore beneficiaries of the State government schemes. Last time, the party had won a total of 1.5 crore votes. Imagine if we could reach out to all the beneficiaries and convince them to vote for the party.”
