Confident of the BJP getting its fourth innings to rule Madhya Pradesh, the party's senior leader Prabhat Jha has said the rival Congress has got only "leaders of constituencies" in the state as against a mass leader the saffron party has got in Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
Jha, the BJP national vice president, said the results of the assembly polls on December 11 will end the Congress' run for good while launching the fourth innings of governance for his party in the state.
"I can say without any hitch that we shall make the government again (in MP). It is true that elections are always tough but it is also true that we shall make government again here," he said.
Jha claimed that the "Congress is nowhere" in Madhya Pradesh.
"Nowhere in the sense that they have no leader. They have leaders of constituencies. When we talk about Jyotiraditya Scindia, he won his Guna (parliamentary) seat only... in Bhind, Morena and Gwalior, we won. Then how can he say he is the leader there?.
"Kamal Nath ji (PCC President) is there only in Chhindwara. There are seven assembly seats in his parliamentary constituency and we won four. Then how can he say that I am the leader of the state?," Jha said.
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The Rajya Sabha MP from the state is the man in-charge of organising the party's high-voltage election campaign in the state and apart from poll rallies he chairs numerous strategy meetings with party workers in various parts of the state daily.
The 61-year-old leader said the Congress was reduced to being a "election party."
"Their leaders and workers are seen only when elections come. We are running a 24X7 campaign of good governance and we have a worker at every booth. This is not true with the Congress.
"While we have a known face in CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Congress has as many as eight faces in the state like Digvijay Singh, Suresh Pachouri, Ajay Singh, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Kamal Nath, Kantilal Bhuria and Deepak Bawaria among others," he said.
Jha also alleged that the opposition party in the state was riddled with "internal fighting".
The politician, who has been a journalist in the past, said the Congress did a "blunder" by saying that it will revise the schemes being run by the current Chouhan government in the state.
"People think will they (Congress) take away all this from them? People are worried. These schemes have worked amongst the people. Hence, I say this is will be our 4th innings and Congress' last. All figures will be decimated," he said.
Jha added that as compared to the Congress' slogan of 'waqt hai badlaav ka' (it is time for change) in these elections, it is actually a battle for 'waqt hai thehraav ka' (it is time for stability).
He said the chief minister was the "brand leader" for the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) in the state and nobody, even the Congress, can challenge it.
We have reached the people of the state with about 300 different schemes and the BJP was "set and registered" in their minds while the Congress has delayed its act, he said.
Asked about the anti-incumbency wave which the party would have gathered after 15 long years in government, Jha said, "There is no anti-incumbency. The same situation was there in 2008 and 2013 polls...some factor of anti-incumbency could be there but Shivraj Singh Chouhan has dealt with it well by forging excellent social relations."
"In the age when social relations are fast eroding, you ask the children who is your 'mama' and pat comes the reply it is the CM. This is a big achievement for us. Similarly the women of the state are with the CM. BJP is a party for all sections of the society," he said.
He charged the Congress of being a "rootless, faceless, baseless and senseless" party in the central Indian state.
The BJP is in power in MP since 2003 and it is fighting a tight contest in the state against the Congress which is looking to grab power this time, alleging an anti-incumbency wave and charges of corruption against CM Chouhan.
Polling for its 230 seats will be held in a single phase on November 28.
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