Wednesday, Jan 08, 2014

New Delhi: India’s ruling Congress party has set aside Rs5 billion (Dh296 million) to design and handle its advertisement campaign during the upcoming general elections.

The party has hired Japan-based Dentsu to design a campaign for the party while the US-based public relations firm Burson-Marsteller will handle its campaign on the social media.

The focus of the advertisement campaign will be to project its vice-president Rahul Gandhi as a young leader capable of delivering on the aspirations of the common man and empower them.

Faced with a tough challenge in its quest to retain power for the third successive tenure, the Congress party is expected to break away from its tradition and name Gandhi, 43, its prime ministerial candidate for the April-May general elections.

Gandhi is likely to be named the prime ministerial candidate during the All India Congress Committee meeting slated to be held here on January 17. Incumbent prime minister Manmohan Singh has already paved the way for Rahul’s elevation by ruling himself out for a third term in office during his press conference on January 3.

Strategy

Traditionally, the Congress party does not name its prime ministerial candidates. However, the principal opposition Bharatiya Janata Party’s move to name its popular Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi as prime ministerial candidate followed by massive defeats of the Congress party in four out of five states that went to the polls late last year forced the Congress party to reconsider its strategy.

Many believe naming Gandhi as prime minister would help the party boost its prospects of taking on Modi and possibly the newly crowned Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal of the fledgling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

According to Congress party sources, the decision to hire the two foreign firms, which have their offices in India, was taken by Gandhi himself. He is said to be taking personal interest and has already held many sessions to give him inputs and review the progress.

While Dentsu would create a short film and prepare advertisements for newspapers and television channels, Burson-Marsteller will handle Gandhi’s Facebook and Twitter accounts. Modi is already using social media to good effect for the past few years, helping him build the image of a progressive regional leader now ready to deliver goods for the entire country.

Slogan

The biggest problem the Congress party is facing is that its plank of aam aadmi (common man) is being used by Arvind Kejriwal’s year old Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). The Congress party has benefitted by projecting itself as saviour of the aam aadmi. But the party cannot now use the word aam aadmi as it would work in favour of the AAP. They will have to coin a phrase to attract voters.

While both the Congress party and the BJP have been hiring professionals to handle their advertisements, it is the first time foreign agencies have been given charge to design the campaign. The Rs5 billion account too would be debated as this excludes the money the party would spend on its campaign through newspapers, television channels and radio.

Many see it as a desperate measure after the party’s debacle in the state polls where the Congress party-led ruling coalition was seen as responsible for widespread corruption in the country and soaring inflation. The party has already started projecting Gandhi as being an anti-corruption crusader after the Lokpal (ombudsman) Bill was passed by parliament after Gandhi’s tactical intervention.

By Ajay Jha ?Chief Correspondent

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