Samajwadi party’s Lok Sabha campaign to be devoid of Bollywood tadka

LUCKNOW: The Samajwadi Party has decided against enlisting Bollywood actors for its Lok Sabha campaign this year, moving away from an earlier strategy that saw popular stars like Amitabh Bachchan drum up crowd support.

“We have our government’s work to speak for. Our leaders are our stars,” said SP minister Rajender Chowdhry. “The presence of Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav) and Akhilesh Yadav is enough to bring in crowds. You must have seen the large crowds at our rallies till now.”

In 2009, with the then SP general secretary Amar Singh hemming the poll campaign, several celebrities, including Sanjay Dutt, Jaya Prada, Jaya Bachchan, Manoj Tiwari and Nafisa Ali, had made appearances at the party’s rallies.

Among the actors who had campaigned for the party, Jaya Bachchan is now a Rajya Sabha member (SP). Sanjay Dutt and Manoj Tiwari were chosen as candidates for the Lok Sabha seats from Lucknow and Gorakhpur, respectively.

They attracted huge crowds but Dutt had to back out due to his legal problems. Tiwari went on to lose the election. Celebrity power was seen in 2007, too, when SP president Mulayam Singh Yadav was the chief minister.

Actor Amitabh Bachchan was appointed as brand ambassador for Uttar Pradesh. His campaign line ahead of the 2007 Assembly polls—”UP mein hai dum, kyunki zurm yahan hai kam”, meaning UP is strong because the crime rate here is low, had caught everyone’s attention.

Two of his campaigns for polio eradication, released just ahead of polling—“ Do Boond Zindagi ke” and “Har bachcha, har baar”— were stopped by the Election Commission. That year, SP went on to loose the Assembly polls to Mayawati.