Lok Sabha polls: BJP launches its campaign anthem

NEW DELHI: BJP unveiled its election anthem with the party’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, as the sole focus with video visuals highlighting issues of national security, protection of women and employment generation.

Both the audio and video versions of the song, featuring Modi who speaks a couple of lines at the beginning, was released by the leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha, Arun Jaitley. The song, "main desh nahi jhukne dunga, main desh nahi mitane dunga, (I will not let the country down, I will not let the country be destroyed)” was penned by lyricist Prasoon Joshi.

ET broke the story on March 10 that Joshi had written the anthem, including some of the lyrics that he had penned. Jaitley justified the limelight on Modi. "It is only natural that the election campaign will be around whoever is being projected as the prime ministerial candidate."

"The BJP anthem song will be played on radio, party campaign vehicles and in our public meetings. Its video version will be shown on television channels as part of our campaign," said Jaitley.

The anthem ends with "Vande Mataram". The anthem was composed by music director Aadesh Srivastav and vocals were provided by Bollywood singer Sukhvinder Singh. The Hindi version will be followed by translations in other languages.