LUCKNOW: For the upcoming rural body elections in Uttar Pradesh, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party is leaving nothing to fate. Considering it as the semi-final for next year's assembly election, the saffron brigade has gone all out to leave its impact on the panchayat elections. From organising chaupals in 50000 villages across the state, the party reaching out to those at the booth level.
The party is ready to issue the list of candidates for the first and second phase of UP Panchayat Polls after a key meeting on Thursday at state party headquarters in Lucknow. All the regional presidents of BJP will be present in the meeting along with the list of candidates of their constituency.
The meeting is likely to be attended by state BJP president Swatantra Dev Singh, state general minister’s organization Sunil Bansal, state in-charge of Panchayat elections Vijay Bahadur Pathak as well as state officials and regional presidents.
The party insiders claimed that the BJP has chalked out a strong lineup of around 15000 programmes with workers participation in booth level seminars, kisan panchayats, district-level meetings for panchayat polls and now chaupals with a focus to strengthen the organisation at the booth level. The BJP workers have been reaching out to people with the achievements of the Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre and the Yogi Adityanath-led government in the state.
Party leaders undertook a campaign carrying the government’s achievement leaflets at the booth level on March 25 and March 26. The BJP is set to declare 3,051 district panchayat ward candidates for the upcoming three-tier panchayat elections.
With this, the party has decided to contest elections on 826 blockhead posts. In the panchayat elections, a mass contact drive is on reaching out to every voter at the ward level.
As per the highly placed sources, the ruling party has planned big meetings at each district panchayat ward. There will be party-supported candidates for Gram Pradhan. The party has made a separate programme for farmers, youths and women. Till the booth level, the party has made its own team of fronts to reach out the voters and also to do the deep-rooted groundwork for Assembly elections through panchayat elections.
On this connection, the regional chief of the party’s state unit will submit the list of candidates for the post of District Panchayat members of the first and second phase of the region. After discussing the names of the candidates, the State Committee will approve this list. If there is a disagreement on a seat, it will be resolved in the meeting as well.
“The schedule has been announced by the Commission in a phased manner. The work of selection of candidates is going on. The party is going to contest the panchayat elections strongly,” State in-charge of BJP Panchayat elections Vijay Bahadur Pathak said.
While the nomination process for the first phase of seats is from April 3 and voting is on April 15, that for the second phase is from April 7 and the voting is on April 19.
The UP gram panchayat elections 2021 will be a key test of the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP government’s popularity, and an opportunity for opposition parties to gauge the public mood, particularly as they come against the backdrop of persisting farmers’ protests in the country that have also gripped parts of UP.