BackBJP to source election funds, support on lines of AAP
Campaign will enable party to reach out to voters, add a measure of transparency to its election
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New Delhi: Impressed by the ability of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to crowdsource funds and support, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has decided to launch a “Modi For PM Fund".
To be sure, this is not the first time the BJP is raising contributions from public, some of it online. Narendra Modi, the BJP’s prime ministerial aspirant, had employed the tactic in his campaign for re-election as Gujarat’s chief minister in 2012. It is, however, the first time the party is looking to scale the campaign nationally.
The two-month-long “one vote, one note" campaign which is starting from 14 January will be run by 20,000 volunteers who have been selected through various social media sites; they will be assisted by BJP workers in the door-to-door campaign.
The thinking within the BJP is that the campaign will enable it to reach out to voters and also add a measure of transparency to its election funding. The party wants to reach at least 100 million households in the country.
“We will try to redefine political and election funding. The focus areas will be urban and semi-urban areas. It is not that the BJP will not go to rural areas but the main focus will be urban areas," said Arvind Gupta, who heads the information technology cell at the BJP.
The election funds will be collected in cash, through debit and credit cards, and even online banking.
Gupta added that because voters demand greater transparency from political parties about election funding, the BJP has decided to rent hand-held receipt issuing machines at ₹ 1,000 per month for volunteers.
“We are going to hire 20,000 of these machines that will give receipts to donors immediately after they deposit money. The receipt will have details about name of donor, mobile number and other necessary information. Apart from the paper receipt, an SMS will also be sent on the mobile phone of the donor," Gupta said.
BJP leaders point out that while the party had started collecting donations online through its website and also at party offices, it has never attempted an outreach programme of this scale. Gupta and his team members say if volunteers are able to complete the task of reaching 100 million households, the BJP, as an organization, would connect with 400-500 million people. At least 250-315 of them are likely to be voters. India has around 750 million voters.
“We will collect funds but the important point is that these volunteers will be able to meet voters first hand" added Gupta.
The Modi campaign will also raise resources for the upcoming general election by collecting a symbolic ₹ 5 at public meetings. The idea was first implemented at Modi’s public meeting in Hyderabad in August last year in which the BJP had collected nearly ₹ 12 lakh. “No donation will be accepted without a receipt," Gupta said.
Experts say the BJP is using the “one vote, one note" technique mastered by the late Kanshi Ram when he formed the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in the 1980s and used to travel on a bicycle across Uttar Pradesh, carrying a bag to collect funds for his party.
More recently, the AAP led by Arvind Kejriwal put up details of donations it received on its website in an effort at transparency that emphasized how the fledgeling party was different from established parties and their opaque ways of raising funds.
“BJP is trying engage voters so that they don’t go towards AAP, which is the real threat for BJP," said Jai Mrug, a political analyst based in Mumbai. “The party doesn’t have a paucity of funds. This campaign is to counter AAP."
The initiative could also help the BJP portray itself as a party that is transparent about its source of funds, Mrug added.
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