Arun Jaitley to teach spokespersons nuance of ruling party briefing

NEW DELHI: The first full-fledged Parliament session of the new government has exposed that BJP is yet to make a transition from being the main opposition to the party in power, at least in its communication strategy. To bridge the gap, the party has institutionalised a weekly meeting (preferably every Monday) between its communications team and finance minister Arun Jaitley.

These meetings will be held to discuss the position of the government on burning issues of the day and what could possibly recur during the week as part of a media storm. “Many of our spokespersons have now become ministers in the new government. And explaining the government’s perspective on issues is a more nuanced job than attacking the government as the opposition,” said a leader who is part of the media team.

The appointment of parliamentary party spokespersons, three for the Lok Sabha (Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Anurag Thakur and Meenakshi Lekhi) and two for the Rajya Sabha ( Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and JP Nadda) to parry questions arising out of parliamentary issues is also expected to improve the sudden communication gap. “A lot of this has come out of the Surajkund meeting of party MPs and their interaction with Prime Minister Narendra Modi,“ said a source.

Modi Throws Dinner for RSS Leaders NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday hosted senior RSS leaders for dinner at his 7 Race Course Road residence. This was the first time he hosted the Sangh top brass since he took over as PM.