LUCKNOW: The BJP has identified around 50,000 polling booths in Uttar Pradesh where it plans to intensify its political spade work in its bid to ramp up its electoral performance in the run-up to 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
According to data collated by the party, out of around 1.75 lakh booths in the state, the party registered a win on 1.28 lakh polling booths in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. If one takes into account the 2014 LS polls, besides the 2017 and 2022 assembly elections, the BJP registered a win on an average 1.05 lakh polling booths.
Sources said that the party has categorized polling booths into three categories. "A" category signifies those booths, which the party has been winning since 2014. Likewise, ‘B’ and ‘C’ category booths are those where the party lost once or more times despite the galactic rise of the party under the leadership of PM Narendra Modi.
A calibrated electoral strategy under its belt, the party has now asked its MPs, MLAs and MLCs to start carrying out a door-to-door campaign in the weaker polling booths. This is also part of an ambitious target of winning 75 out of 85 Lok Sabha seats in 2024, said sources.
"The most important aspect of any campaign is ‘Sampark’ (contact) and ‘Samvaad’ (dialogue). And this is where we would be working on," said UP BJP vice-president Vijay Bahadur Pathak. Sources said that the public representatives have been asked to aggressively reach out to the beneficiaries of the various schemes. "After all, that forms a big chunk of the electorate which has been showing allegiance towards the BJP," said UP BJP spokesperson Avnish Tyagi.
While the over 85 Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs will carry out public outreach campaigns in 100 booths each, the 255 MLAs and nearly 70 MLCs will do so in 25 booths each. Sources said that the public representatives have been asked to step up the dialogue with an array of communities including Dalits, MBCs and minorities to assuage their apprehensions and address their problems.
The party brass is expected to move into an overdrive soon after the national executive committee scheduled in Hyderabad (Telangana) in the first week of July, when the saffron pantheon would spell out its political resolution and draft its political strategy. This will also coincide with the appointment of a new UP BJP chief, who will constitute his own team of party functionaries. Sources said that the appointment of a new UP BJP president – the incumbent Swatantra Dev Singh has been appointed a minister in the Yogi Adityanath cabinet – will set the state unit in a motion that will determine its electoral fortunes in 2024.
