BJP To Woo Bihar Voters With 160 GPS-monitored Raths 1 Lakh Rallies

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is all set to undertake a ‘Rath Yatra' blitzkrieg in the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections. 
BJP patriarch LK Advani's Rath Yatra may have been stopped by Lalu Yadav in October 1990 at Samastipur, but this time the BJP is all set to roll out 160 high-tech GPS-monitored raths to spread the message of change. 
Christened the ‘Parivartan Rath', the BJP's high-tech election mobiles aim to reach out to the 6.5 crore electorate through one lakh assembly meetings in 100 days. 
Union Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad (second from left), BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha and senior party leader Sushil Kumar Modi along with other party leaders at a party meeting in Patna
"In the previous elections at 9,300 booths, results were decided by a margin of merely 50 votes in Bihar. Party national president Amit Shah's message to the Bihar party unit is to ensure the 160 ‘Parivartan Raths' are used in 1,000-1,200 meetings and sabhas every day," BJP sources told Mail Today. 
‘Bring 100 additional voters per booth to win elections in Bihar,' is the message from party chief Shah. 
The BJP president is all set to kick-start the poll campaign in Patna on July 16 and prepare for a massive show of strength at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Muzaffarpur rally on July 25. 
About 1,00,000 rallies in 100 days is the ambitious target set by the central BJP unit working in tandem with the state unit. 
"A decision is also expected shortly on whether the party will announce a chief ministerial candidate. The party has been deliberating on the issue. In Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Haryana the party fought on issues and won elections without declaring a CM candidate. In Delhi, a CM candidate, though an outsider, was decided at the last moment and it led to a total rout," sources said. 
The recent Legislative Council election results have come as a shot in the arm for the BJP.

The cadres are enthused working on a combination of caste politics and the agenda of development. 
The BJP will systematically target ‘jungle raj' under Lalu Yadav and the complete collapse of administration after the split of BJP and Janata Dal-United. 
"We clearly cannot target the entire JD-U tenure as we were a part of it. So the campaign will focus entirely on the collapse of administration and use of pictures like widespread cheating in examination to show Nitish Kumar cannot bring development and change that Bihar needs," sources added. 
The number crunching is over and booth-level operations planned. 
For 62,779 booths in Bihar, Amit Shah insists that there should be 20 workers at each booth instead of the usual five to 10 workers.

This will ensure higher turnout in this make-or-break battle for Bihar. 
"A swing of additional 100 votes will swing elections in favour of the BJP. We have already reached out to our workers in the 800 villages. Now they are reaching out to spread the message of change to bring back the old glory of Bihar. The BJP will systematically target youths and women to ensure they vote breaking the caste barriers for change," party sources in Bihar said. 
The ‘Abki Baar Modi Sarkar' slogan in Bihar has been replaced by ‘Abki Baar BJP Sarkar' for now.
  Manjhi keeps NDA guessing on alliance 
By Giridhar Jha in Patna 
Former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi is keeping the Bharatiya Janata Party in Bihar on tenterhooks with his flip-flop on his association with the National Democratic Alliance. 
The founder of the Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular (HAM-S) has made it clear that he would part ways with the NDA if his party did not get a respectable number of seats for the upcoming Bihar elections. 
Manjhi said there won't be any compromise on seat sharing
"There will not be any compromise on the question of honour," Manjhi said in Jehananad. 
Manjhi, who is yet to formally join the NDA, did not specify the number of seats he wanted for his outfit but said that he would like to get the seats for all the legislators in support of him under the "sitting-getting" formula. 
"We will seek tickets for our candidates only on the basis of their ability to win the polls. We will not demand any extra seats just for the heck of it," he said. 
Manjhi, www.reddit.com who has emerged as a key player ahead of the Assembly polls, said that the seat-sharing formula would be discussed among the NDA allies and a collective decision would be taken in a closed-door meeting.