BJP, Cong want to test public pulse thru yatra

Political Analysis

Yogesh Mishra

Raipur, April 06, 2013

With nearing assembly elections, BJP and Congress are desperate to know what people think about them. Though both parties claim that they would get majority votes in upcoming polls, none is certain about its victory. On pretext of yatra, both parties actually want to read the public mindset so that they could frame a viable plan to taste success.

Apparently, the purpose of yatra for both parties is to increase vote bank. Usually, the political parties claim success of their rallies or yatras on the basis of paid crowd, but on threshold of elections, both BJP and Congress understand that this trick will not produce any anticipated result. 

They have indicated of sticking to traditional political method of attracting people; the BJP - being the ruling party, will publicise its achievements and budgetary announcements while the Congress - as an opposition party, will raise all the burning issues which the government failed to deal. 

Now, in  scorching summer with no unique plans, it will be interesting to see how these parties will succeed in pulling crowd, although they will somewhat manage to mobilise their workers. 

Talking about Congress first - the party will start parivartan yatra from April 12. It has already launched door-to-door campaign on the first day of this month. The two drives of the party are said to have Rahul Gandhi-effect. These drives took strategical shape because Gandhi was not amused by the state unit’s previous formulae of convincing voters. He wanted the party to directly reach to people by adopting simple techniques – hence the idea of door-to-door campaign and parivartan yatra came forth. 

To attack the BJP government, the party has no dearth of issues - CAG revelation is the latest weapon in its armoury, yet people would want it talk on local matters. In fact, for people – primary issues like road, water, electricity, health, education, security, etc are more significant than grafts and scams. 

In the past, the Congress has raked up issues like corruption in MNREGA works several times, but failed to get Central support. The party also created much hue and cry over previous year’s CAG report, but no one remembers about it now. This will happen with this year’s CAG report too. The party has recently alleged that several patients lost their eyesight in government eye camps because duplicate medicines were used, but even this revelation will not deter the poor patients in going to such camps in future.

The Congress keeps on claiming that that people no more trust the government, nevertheless, over 90% of the state population depends on state-run facilities and schemes. The opposition will actually have to convince people that through parivartan yatra, it can bring positive changes in state, especially in far-fetched ill-facilitated areas. 

The BJP, on the other hand, will start vikas yatra from May 6. The ruling party is aiming to eclipse the Congress shows through its yatra, but how will it accomplish this task is a major question. The party lacks energy as is obvious from the CM’s remark on announcement day of the yatra that workers should not go to people with subdued face. 

Everyone in BJP wants to remain in his comfort zone despite polls in the offing. No one is interested in doing hard work in yatra. Certainly, the CM and a handful of senior BJP leaders, who are hoping for party’s third consecutive victory in polls, are worried. 

Yes, it is very difficult to remain spirited when one has no higher target to achieve. The BJP is at the helm for over nine years. The party has nothing to protest. Of course, it reacts to opposition’s activities, but that too occasionally. 

To infuse energy in workers, the party needs a charismatic leader. The party fought previous elections projecting CM as its brand ambassador. Then, the government’s ‘Rs 2 per kg rice formula for poor’ clicked at right time. This time, the party feels that it would have to import a brand ambassador from national cadre in the hustings. 

In nine year, the number of workers in the party has reduced as majority of them have promoted themselves as leaders. Last year, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat too had expressed concern over increasing army of leaders in BJP after party’s Uttar Pradesh poll debacle. Chhattisgarh BJP too has redundant leaders while the CM wants grassroot workers to come forward for yatra. 

The BJP has announced that the government will take out vikas yatra and the organisation will support it. People are confused whether it is really happening for the first time. The government has taken nagar and gram suraj yatras in the past and claimed to have received massive response from the people, though the number of grievances redressed against the applications received that time was much low than expectation. 

Under vikas yatra, once again the CM and his ministers will go to people. The party workers will support the ministers. Presently, there is a huge communication gap between the ministers and party workers. The ministers say the workers do not publicise government works while the workers say the ministers ignore them. 

Some of the workers even feel that few ministers have failed to do justice to their portfolios and their chances of victory in polls are faint. In this scenario, it will be a challenging task for the organisation to ensure that the ministers and workers develop a rapport during yatra. 

Moreover, when the party will talk of government’s developmental works, the people will not only point towards pending works of their areas, but also seek enhanced facilities. Usually, when the ruling party speaks, the people want to hear everything from it – from its achievements to shortcomings to pending promises. 

Hence, besides its accomplishments, the BJP will have to tell why it failed to maintain law and order, check rape incidents, eradicate grafts and curb naxalism. Since, no political party in power speaks of its lacking before public, the BJP too will not do, but it will surely have make the people believe that it is the only option to come to power again. 

Further, timing of yatra can play crucial role for both the parties. The Congress is starting yatra almost one month ahead of BJP. It will surely try to derive maximum mileage out of all the issues and create negative image of the government. Meanwhile, it can also amend its strategy to attack the ruling party. Contrarily, the BJP will closely monitor the Congress yatra and act accordingly. By starting late, it rather plans to steal the Congress show by following the latter’s footsteps.