BHOPAL: Digital wallet-online payment company PhonePe has demanded Madhya Pradesh Congress to remove its logo from the party's posters targeting Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
Tweets from PhonePe’s official Twitter handle read, “The PhonePe logo is a registered trademark of our company and any unauthorized use of PhonePe’s intellectual property rights will invite legal action. We humbly request @INCMP to remove the posters and banners featuring our brand logo and colour. PhonePe objects to the unauthorized usage of its brand logo, by any third party, be it political or non-political. We are not associated with any political campaign or party.”
This comes a day after three office bearers of Congress’s student wing NSUI were booked in Chhindwara district for allegedly pasting posters bearing pictures of Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
Reacting to the tweets, state Congress’s media wing head KK Mishra, while denying Congress’s hand in those posters, told The New Indian Express on Thursday, “Let them (PhonePe) initiate legal action, we’ll reply in the appropriate legal manner.”
A day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Bhopal, posters bearing PhonePe’s brand name and logo titled ‘50% Lao PhonePe Kaam Karao: Accepted Mama’ were found pasted in a few parts of Bhopal, Indore, Singrauli, Chhindwara, Satna and Gwalior.
The posters carrying a QR Code with CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan's picture accused the BJP leader of corruption in the poll-bound state.
While the Congress has denied any hand in those posters, the Chhindwara district police, on the common complaint of the local municipality as well as the district BJP, lodged a case on June 26, under IPC Section 504 and the provisions of Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, against three local NSUI office bearers, Ajay Thakur, Samarth, Tanul Sharma.
The three were allegedly caught on camera holding and posting the objectionable posters.
Notably, the ongoing war of posters had begun in Bhopal’s Manisha Market area on June 23, when similar QR Code posters bearing state Congress chief Kamal Nath’s pictures reading ‘Wanted: Corruption Nath’ were found on the walls.
While the ruling BJP denied any hand in the posters, Congress leaders protested at Bhopal’s Chuna Bhatti police station on June 23 afternoon, demanding a case registered against the culprits.
A few hours later on the very evening, objectionable posters with Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, with the title, ‘Shivraj Nahi Ghotala Raj’ appeared on the walls at multiple locations, including close to the Vallabh Bhawan, Satpura Bhawan, No 5 Bus Stop and a shopping mall.
The next day (June 24), ‘Wanted: Corruption Nath’ posters and ‘Mahangai Dayan’ posters bearing pictures of union minister Smriti Irani (who was visiting Indore the same day) were found in many areas of Indore.
Reacting to the ongoing war of posters, the state Congress president Kamal Nath said on Monday, “The dirty poster politics was started by the BJP using some third party. Let them make films, posters or launch websites, it’s not going to have any effect.”
The ongoing poster war revives the memory of the recent Karnataka assembly polls when in the run-up to the polls, the posters with pictures of then Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai and the "40 per cent sarkar" and "PayCM" slogans were key elements in the Congress' campaign.