GUWAHATI: Six helicopters, 38 thousand WhatAapp groups and a hefty budget tipped to run into a few hundred crores of rupees will be pressed into the service by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to make the final push to retain its rule in Assam.
With the Assam assembly elections are just months away, BJP’s war room has drawn up extensive plans to give a final push to its election campaign where the party faces stiff challenge from its rivals.
According to sources in state BJP, six helicopters have been hired out of which three will be in all-day service with chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal, finance minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and party president Ranjeet Dass. The other three will be kept for ferrying national leaders to the public rallies during the election campaign.
A galaxy of star campaigners will visit Assam in the next one month to campaign in various constituencies.
Moreover, 38,000 WhatsApp groups have been formed which will be used for the digital campaign - a key element of BJP’s election strategy. Each assembly constituency will have a team of 10 members. These teams will circulate audio and video clips among party members.
The party also moved 50 video vans to collect feedback from people and gauge their expectations from the government. On the basis of this feedback, the election manifesto will be drafted. The party has also formed a research team that identified important issues for each assembly constituency.
Behind the party’s omnipresence on social media were a number of coordinated teams. At the state level, it formed a team of information technology experts.
The saffron camp has also readied a team of 3.20 lakh ‘prishtha pramukhs’ to connect with every family ahead of the upcoming elections to the 126-member Assam Assembly. Each prishtha pramukh is in charge of one page of the electoral rolls. His or her brief is to meet every person on the voters’ list on an assigned page.
“The 3.20 lakh party workers are trained on how to go about their job, meet people to know about their aspirations as well as areas where our party has not been up to the mark,” a BJP spokesperson said.
Assam is slated to go to polls in April this year along with West Bengal and four other states.