BJP holds review meet
Top BJP leaders met to review poll performance and decided to make "all out" effort in last phase.
With the final phase of polling mostly in states considered non-NDA bastions, BJP on Thursday decided to go all out in the fourth phase in an attempt to get a "decisive mandate".
As part of an action plan formulated at a review meeting of top leaders chaired by party president M Venkaiah Naidu, a host of senior leaders are being deputed in the election-bound states as part of the efforts "to run the last mile like a marathon champion."
Later Naidu briefed Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani on the meeting.
While Advani, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha and Naidu will be campaigning in the South, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh has been entrusted North Eastern states and West Bengal.
Law Minister Arun Jaitley has been deputed to Punjab while Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhare Raje has been asked to canvas for the party in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab.
Party General Secretary Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi has been asked to take care of Muslim dominated areas of Rampur, Bijnor, Bareilly and Moradabad.
Besides Jaswant Singh, the party has deputed party Vice President Pyarelal Khandelwal and Bapu Apte to look into organisational matters in the North Eastern states and West Bengal.
Party General Secretary Sanjay Joshi has been deputed to oversee organisational functioning in Uttar Pradesh till the end of polling.
Besides the exit polls predictions, the meeting also reviewed the feedback on the last three phases of elections received from its whole time 'chunav sahayaks' (poll assistants), party sources said.
It discussed the efficacy of 'nigrani dals' (vigilant squads), comprising its youth and women's wing activists, which were deployed at over 700 sensitive booths across the country during the third phase of polling, the sources said.
According to the feedback on the third phase of polling, the party has got 59 of the 83 seats with its tally in the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh touching 20 of the 30 where polling was held.
The report has given the party 22 of the 25 seats in Rajathan which went to polls while in Madhya Pradesh the party is expecting to bag 11 of the 12 seats.
In Bihar, of the 12 seats in the third phase, the party is expecting to get four while its ally, JD(U) is likely to get three taking their overall tally to seven.