Amit Shah's UP Plan Has A Twist, Will Keep Lawmakers On Their Toes

Allahabad: The BJP will conduct surveys every four months to ensure its campaign for the must-win Uttar Pradesh elections remains politically relevant and in sync with ground realities.

The exercise will include an assessment, based on surveys, of the campaigns of rival parties, it was decided at a meeting, over three hours long, that BJP president Amit Shah held with his party's parliamentarians from UP after a two-day conclave in Allahabad.  

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who represents Varanasi in parliament, was to attend the meeting, but flew back to Delhi in a last-minute change after addressing a huge rally at Allahabad's parade ground. Home Minister Rajnath Singh, the MP from Lucknow, too returned to Delhi.

Other notables absentees included Varun Gandhi, MP from Sultanpur; hundreds of hoardings featuring the 36-year-old that came up in Allahabad ahead of the BJP conclave - viewed as an attempt by his supporters to project him as a face in Uttar Pradesh - has not gone down well with the party top brass. Hema Malini, who represents Mathura, also did not attend the meeting.

But the BJP's 65-odd other lawmakers from UP attended, along with the party's organisational general secretary Ram Lal, who is from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or RSS, the party's ideological mentor. Krishna Gopal, the RSS' second in command, too attended Mr Shah's meeting.

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UP has to elect a new assembly by March 2017 and the BJP can squeeze in at least two reviews, starting now. The surveys, it was felt at the meeting, will allow the party leadership to tweak the campaign according to the ground situation at the time and what the party's political rivals do.  

"This virtually means the end of a fixed political campaign tied to a manifesto. The BJP will get feedback on its campaign and that of others and suitably keep amending it," a senior MP said.

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The exercise will keep the party's lawmakers on their toes, with the leadership also scrutinising their performance, since the party feels that voters' response is impacted by how each MP performs in his constituency and pushes the implementation of central schemes.

The meet also signalled that the RSS may play more than an advisory role in the UP elections, like it did in the Assam elections, which the BJP won last month. Top sources said Mr Gopal will helm the RSS' effort in UP.  

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Earlier in the day, PM Modi asked BJP leaders not to waste the opportunity and design their conduct on what he called the seven Ss in Hindi, beginning with Seva or service.