Shah to step up UP blitz, focus on booth management
LUCKNOW: Following up on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call to end the ‘SP-BSP’ jugalbandi in Uttar Pradesh, BJP chief Amit Shah would step up his UP offensive through his visits during which he would connect with booth presidents across the state.
Beginning with Barabanki on June 27, Shah would travel to western UP’s Meerut three days later and would subsequently be seen in Gorakhpur and Kashi regions of the state in the first week of July. Shah’s increasing UP forays would also coincide with growing public appearances of Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well union home minister Rajnath Singh who was described by PM during his Allahabad rally as UP’s ‘aan, baan aur shaan (UP’s pride).”
It’s the triumvirate of Modi, Shah and Rajnath along with able support of another trio of RSS men in the BJP - Shiv Prakash and Sunil Bansal along with the party’s UP in-charge Om Mathur that the BJP hopes to put in place a ‘winning strategy’ in the state. As the UP in-charge in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, Shah had focused on boothlevel management; a strategy that the party’s UP unit now has been asked to put in place ahead of the 2017 UP polls.
“Shah has already held two booth level meetings in UP – one each in Kanpur and Kasganj. For these meetings with the party president, booth level presidents are being invited. The party has maintained a separate list of booth-level cadres complete with their names and phone numbers for verification,” a BJP insider said. The BJP has set up a boothmanagement committee which has been tasked with monitoring majority of the nearly 1.38 lakh booths in the state.
“We have verified nearly 90,000 plus booths in the state. Details of each assembly segment too are available with us. We are all set to roll out our UP plan,” says BJP’s UP in-charge and national vice president Om Mathur who was handpicked by Shah for the key assignment.
Party insiders say senior BJP leaders have complete information about booth presidents and are keeping in touch with them on phone, e-mail and WhatsApp.
For Shah’s Kanpur and Kasganj booth level meets, for instance, the BJP’s UP unit had personally sent invites to booth presidents. State BJP chief Keshav Prasad Maurya personally monitored the booth level management. “We spoke to nearly each one of them in one way or the other. This was in a way also a verification exercise of sorts,” a BJP insider said.
“This is one strategy that BSP chief Mayawati was so good at. But having got so many of her aides in the party now, the BJP too is piecing together a strategy that includes expanding the party network in rural areas,” said a party insider.
For organizational purpose, the BJP has divided the state into six regions and by July first week Shah would have connected with booth level workers of all these regions. “If you break it down further, you would realize that the party chief effectively would be connecting with the party cadre across 1400 plus divisions (mandals), nearly 10000 sub divisions and 92 district units of the party. The booth level workers would also be tasked with popularizing the Modi government’s initiatives in UP.
“See the BJP think tank knows that local issues in UP also play a key role in shaping public opinion and influencing outcomes. That is why the booth-level workers would also come in handy in keeping an eye on local developments,” an insider said.