BENGALURU: In a bid to woo the urban poor ahead of forthcoming elections to the Legislative Assembly, leaders of the state unit of BJP have decided to spend a night in slums across Karnataka and gain firsthand experience of problems encountered by slum dwellers.
BJP leaders said in order to fulfill the dream of Deendayal Upadhaya, party founder, they would spend a night in slums and listen to their grievances. On Saturday, state unit president B S Yeddyurappa stayed at Laxmanpuri slum in Gandhinagar Assembly segment in Bengaluru, and released a book ‘Slum Dourbhagya’ listing problems faced by slum dwellers across the state. The party assured to provide basic infrastructure and houses to those who staying in the slums.
According to sources in the state unit BJP, the main intention of these leaders would be to woo the urban poor as a majority of them are staunch supporters of the Congress.
The party was confident of securing the support of the lower middle class and middle class voters in cities, and therefore would strive to garner the support of urban poor voters as well in order to win more seats in Bengaluru and other urban areas. At present, the party has gained the support of 10 to 15 percent of urban poor voters in cities, and would aim to cross the 50 per cent mark in order to dent the vote bank of Congress. The leaders are also aware of the fact that slum votes could be secured through money and gifts, but the promise of providing basic infrastructure to slum dwellers could help change the mind set of residents of slums in the forthcoming elections, sources added.
Mr. Yeddyurappa has promised to provide houses, roads, street lights, 24x7 drinking water to slum residents if voted to power. Mr. Yeddyurappa has criticized the Congress for neglecting slums.
Along with Mr Yeddyurappa, several senior leaders including K.S.Eshwarappa, Jagadish Shettar, Shobha Karandlaje, Govinda Karjol, and Thippeswamy stayed in slums in their respective constituencies.
