Lucknow:
The Akhilesh Yadav government in Uttar Pradesh, whiplashed by criticism over law and order and other issues, has decided to hire a Public Relations agency to help improve its image.
The agency will assist the UP government's information department in propagating its welfare schemes, Chief Secretary Alok Ranjan told reporters. The decision to hire a PR agency was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav he said.
An agency would be selected after by inviting tenders, the official said.
The 42-year-old Mr Yadav had spearheaded his party's convincing victory in the UP state elections two years ago, with new ideas and promises, but has since been criticised for his leadership. With crime unabated in the state, women attacked with alarming regularity and many incidents of communal violence, rivals have called for his dismissal.
In the general elections this year, UP voters signaled a disenchantment with the Samajwadi Party - it could win only three of 80 seats; two of those were won by SP chief and Akhilesh's father Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Even a glitzy promotion of Mulayam Yadav based on Billy Joel's popular song "We didn't Start the Fire" ahead of the 2014 general elections did not help. It was Akhilesh's idea to buy rights to the song and turn it into - "Man se hain Mulayam Irade Loha hai" (He is soft-hearted but iron-willed).
Uttar Pradesh will vote only in 2017 for a new assembly, but a rejuvenated BJP, which won 71 of UP's seats this year, has already declared it is prepping to wrest power in the crucial state. A spot of image management could indeed stand the young Mr Yadav in good stead.
The agency will assist the UP government's information department in propagating its welfare schemes, Chief Secretary Alok Ranjan told reporters. The decision to hire a PR agency was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav he said.
An agency would be selected after by inviting tenders, the official said.
The 42-year-old Mr Yadav had spearheaded his party's convincing victory in the UP state elections two years ago, with new ideas and promises, but has since been criticised for his leadership. With crime unabated in the state, women attacked with alarming regularity and many incidents of communal violence, rivals have called for his dismissal.
In the general elections this year, UP voters signaled a disenchantment with the Samajwadi Party - it could win only three of 80 seats; two of those were won by SP chief and Akhilesh's father Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Even a glitzy promotion of Mulayam Yadav based on Billy Joel's popular song "We didn't Start the Fire" ahead of the 2014 general elections did not help. It was Akhilesh's idea to buy rights to the song and turn it into - "Man se hain Mulayam Irade Loha hai" (He is soft-hearted but iron-willed).
Uttar Pradesh will vote only in 2017 for a new assembly, but a rejuvenated BJP, which won 71 of UP's seats this year, has already declared it is prepping to wrest power in the crucial state. A spot of image management could indeed stand the young Mr Yadav in good stead.
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