Leaders like Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley have done this before, but this is the first time a Prime Minister from the BJP is interacting with boo-level karyakartas
New Delhi: The 2019 general election may be a year away, but for the ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) the preparation is in full swing. In what is being seen as a warm up to 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in the capacity of a senior BJP leader, will directly address BJP workers, starting this month.
Modi’s team has chosen five constituencies to begin the exercise with: Jaipur (Rural), Hazaribagh, Nawada, Arunachal (West) and Ghaziabad. Interestingly, MPs from these constituencies are Union ministers. The constituencies are represented by Information & Broadcasting Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, Civil Aviation Minister Jayant Sinha, Minister of State for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, MoS Home Kiran Rijiju and MoS External Affairs General VK Singh.
Sources privy to the information say the Prime Minister will instruct the workers what to do to mobilise people on the ground — right at the booth level. Sources also say they are exploring the option to make it a two-way communication where the Prime Minister will take selected questions from the cadre. It's named as “Mera Booth Sabse Mazboot Samvad”. The idea is to rejuvenate booth-level workers of the BJP. The first one in a series of such communications will take place on September 13.
The exchange will happen through video conferences. Such exchanges are not new in the BJP, with senior leaders like Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley meeting booth-level workers across the country in the run up to the 2014 general election. But for the first time a Prime Minister will have such political interactions with booth-level cadres of his party.
Last Updated Sep 9, 2018, 10:48 AM IST