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After unity efforts, BJP launches booth connect, rural-centric initiatives in Uttar Pradesh
The initiatives have been launched with an eye on the 2022 UP assembly polls and the zila (district) panchayat chairpersons’ elections scheduled on July 3
A day after the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) brokered truce between chief minister Yogi Adityanath and his deputy Keshav Prasad Maurya, the Bharatiya Janata Party got down to work, rolling out a series of booth-connect and rural centric initiatives on Wednesday.
The party had also invited all former state BJP chiefs to an important party meeting on Tuesday.
The party workers began work on the party’s “booth jeeta, sab jeeta (win booth, win everything)” plan on Wednesday, as did the leaders, each tasked with specific roles. The initiatives were taken with an eye on the 2022 UP assembly polls as well as making an impression in the forthcoming zila (district) panchayat chairpersons’ elections on July 3.
Plantation drives till the booth level were launched on Wednesday, Jana Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee’s death anniversary. Now onwards, party workers would head to villages on the last Sunday of each month to listen to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s radio talk, Mann ki Baat, at the booth level. As many as 299 of UP’s 403 assembly constituencies have a rural or semi-rural character.
The BJP had lost out to the Samajwadi Party (SP) in the first leg of the panchayat elections for zila panchayat ward members. It is now looking to make amends in the zila chairpersons’ elections. The party leadership rushed national general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh twice to UP over the last 20 days to write the “unity” script in the ruling party at the state level.
It was as part of this script that chief minister Yogi Adityanath drove from his 5-Kalidas Marg residence to his deputy Keshav Prasad Maurya’s 7-Kalidas Marg residence on Tuesday. He had lunch there in the presence of RSS top leaders Dattatreya Hosbale and veteran Krishna Gopal, as well as the other deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma.
The CM’s lunch meet was portrayed as a visit to bless Maurya’s son and daughter-in-law, who married at a simple ceremony in Rae Bareli in May due to Covid restrictions. But, political observers were quick to see beyond it. Maurya, an OBC face of his party who was the state unit chief in 2017 UP assembly polls, played down the visit. On Wednesday, he was more active than before and was part of the efforts to placate a recalcitrant, but important ally, Sanjay Nishad of the Nishad party, who is engaged in some hard pre-poll bargaining.
“Politics is all about symbolism. If the chief minister’s first visit to his deputy’s place on Tuesday was powerful symbolism, his deputy’s gesture of meeting an important ally and his willingness to play the role of a troubleshooter by helping placate an ally is good news for BJP ahead of elections,” said Irshad Ilmi, a veteran journalist and political observer.
Other leaders, too, were on the job. UP ministers have been asked to visit districts of which they are in charge, while Jitin Prasada, the former Congress leader who recently joined the BJP, set out on Wednesday to connect with the key upper caste Brahmin community.
In his meetings with ministers, Santhosh reportedly praised Adityanath’s governance. He said that unlike in the 2017 UP polls when the party had only the Modi government’s achievements to talk about, this time the cadres should also market the achievements of the Adityanath government.
In his last two visits, Santhosh has praised Adityanath through his tweets at least four times. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too, has tweeted in Adityanath’s support once in this period.
It was as part of the unity script that all former UP BJP chiefs, including Vinay Katiyar and Laxmikant Bajpai, were called to the UP BJP office for joint consultations by Santhosh before he left for Delhi. During Santhosh’s visit, former IAS officer- turned BJP MLC AK Sharma, a former aide of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, also publicly announced he was “happy” with his new role as UP BJP vice- president.
“The government has begun accommodating cadres in commissions and boards while the party is filling up all pending party positions. The government and the party are one, we are in election mode now,” a BJP minister said.
