Congress ad blitzkrieg in the works

Party insists ad agencies come up with survey-based ideas for campaign - 'what people think about Congress-led UPA'

As the countdown to the 2014 polls has begun, the Congress has started making preparations to unleash an advertisement blitzkreig to woo the electorate. The senior leadership led by Digvijay Singh, who will be the media and publicity in-charge for 2014, has been reviewing ‘ad pitches’ by leading ad agencies.

According to sources, the party has insisted that agencies come up with survey-based ideas for the campaign, “What people think about the Congress-led UPA”.

“Our brief is very clear: The achievements of the Congress-led UPA (United Progressive Alliance) in its two terms have to be showcased. How best each agency does it is the moot point. The Congress’ has been a ‘rights’-based approach - right to food, right to employment (MNREGA),” said a party source.

However, Narendra Modi will not be focussed in any way, the source said. “We will not be critical or targeting anybody.” As for the UPA, which is being lambasted for a series of corruption related scams, the Congress’ line is that it is the UPA which has been at the forefront of measures alleviating corruption - the RTI Act, the Whistleblowers Act, etc.

Till date, 11 agencies including JWT, Percept, Crayons, Equus and Grey have made ad pitches to the team comprising Singh, Ajay Maken, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jairam Ramesh, Deepinder Hooda, Vishwajit Prithvijit Singh, Manish Tewari at the party’s ‘War Room’ at GRG Marg. The presentations are then sent to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, who is likely to be the party’s face of the 2014 campaign. However, the final call, would be taken by Rahul and party president Sonia Gandhi, sources added.

“The feedback that we have received so far in all the presentations we have seen is that we need to do a better job of effectively spreading the Congress message, that is, its achievements, the rights that we have given to the people – food, employment, land Bill, right to fair compensation, right to education, etc,” said a senior leader who is part of the deliberations.

The agency that will finally be zeroed in on will be tasked with making the creatives for the print and electronic media. The process this time has been far more elaborate than in the past as Rahul Gandhi has taken over as the overall in-charge of the Election Coordination Committee. First, presentations were taken, then there was also deliberation whether the outdoor publicity should be outsourced to some other agency.

The senior leader quoted above added that because of the upcoming Assembly elections, this could now take a back seat as the party and its leaders will be focused on state elections in crucial states this November.

In the last 2009 Lok Sabha polls, Crayons and Percept had bagged the Congress ad contract. No agency had been finalised as yet for this year, said a senior Congress leader.

The UPA’s Bharat Nirman has already started showcasing the Congress-led government’s achievements across all media. According to parry sources, although no timeline has been fixed when to launch the party ad blitzkrieg, it could be launched before the code of conduct kicks in March next year.