COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ELECTIONS
ARCHIVES

Parties get ready for political top ten

One has always heard of the 'top ten' in songs, music albums, films, or film personalities. But in an era where the small screen plays a major role in image-presentation, political parties are busy drawing up their lists of leaders who can present their case to the general public.

It is learnt that the Bharatiya Janata Party had taken the help of a private-sector television channel to identify those party leaders, other than Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who have left the best impression on the public mind. The 'top ten' of the BJP selected on the basis of the channel's report include two women.

The BJP's 'top ten' are: Venkaiah Naidu, Krishan Lal Sharma, Govindacharya, Pramod Mahajan, Jaswant Singh, Sushma Swaraj, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Arun Jaitley, Narendra Modi and Uma Bharati.

And in an attempt to put their best foot forward, professionals are training the selected politicians on how they should dress, how they should look, how they should smile, how to sit and face the camera, and generally how they should conduct themselves.

It is learnt that the Congress party is also taking the help of television channels and software production houses to draw up a list of its own 'top ten'.

The BJP is beginning tomorrow its national campaign to educate the populace against voting for parties which had needlessly caused the fall of the Vajpayee government and forced elections on the nation. The campaign also coincides with one year of the Pokhran nuclear tests last year.

The BJP has also tied up with local cable and television networks in many places to give live or deferred live telecasts for the general public.

The telecasts are beginning with Prime Minister Vajpayee's rally in Bombay tomorrow to mark the Resurgent India Day (Jagrit Bharat Divas) to mark the first anniversary of the Pokhran tests. The others whose rallies in the coming weeks are to be covered live or deferred live or recorded and shown in full on local cable networks will be L K Advani and Venkaiah Naidu, apart from Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar, Jaswant Singh in Madras, K N Govindacharya in Hyderabad, Sushma Swaraj in Lucknow, Narendra Modi in Karnataka, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi in Raipur (Madhya Pradesh), Yashwant Sinha in Kerala, Uma Bharati in Bihar and George Fernandes in Indore.

UNI

Tell us what you think of this report