BJP banks on `trust', sets election campaign rolling with surrogate ads

Mukta Magazine

New Delhi, Aug 9: After days of mulling over a string of slogans, the BJP has finally settled for the catchline: Tried, tested, trusted (Jaancha, parkha, khara.) to drive its ad campaign for the elections. This is the main slogan that will be splashed on hoardings, posters and banners across the country to push its personality-oriented campaign. Other slogans that made it to the final round had included: `A 100 % Indian party,' variants of `Atal hain iraada/Bharat ke iraade Atal hain' and Sapne adhure karne hain poore.' With its main slogan in place, the BJP has set its campaign for the elections rolling by launching a series of thinly-veiled election ads in daily newspapers. Released by Front organisations, the ads address important BJP election issues-Kargil and Sonia Gandhi, but do not carry the party name or symbol. This in fact, marks the build-up to the party's campaign in the media, which should gain momentum by the week-end, when the first of the election ads are set for release.

The first of the`surrogate campaign' ads appeared in dailies on August 5. Released by the Purv Sainik Seva Parishad, it was an election ad, indirectly targeting the Congress for `saying Kargil was no victory.' It ended, saying: `Lets not insult our soldiers by calling a glorious victory, a defeat.'The second ad, splashed in papers on Monday (August 9), indirectly targets Sonia Gandhi. The full-page, 400 cc DAVP ad talks about Mahatma Gandhi's `Quit India' call, which had `asked a foreign ruler to quit our motherland.. And the foreign ruler was forced to leave...' adding, `Today let us solemnly pledge to defend this freedom.'

Meanwhile, the in-house BJP taskforce, consisting of Sushil Pandit of Contract Advertising and R P Singh, is now, firmly in the saddle as far as handling the campaign goes. Assisting them in fine tuning the creatives, will be Shiven Surendranath, who has joined Chaitra Leo Burnett recently as creative director. Trikaya Grey and possibly Crayons will handle part of the media releases, along with SushilPandit.

The party campaign will focus on the performance of the government. While the overall campaign will revolve around Vajpayee and the performance of his government, other issues like Kargil, stable economy, crop insurance and the Cauvery issue, will be highlighted in the campaign. While Kargil and economic issues will be part of the national campaign, Cauvery and crop insurance will be issues highlighted in the regional campaigns.

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