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Of phones and shawls

By Neena Vyas

NEW DELHI, MARCH 23. The Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee's recorded message to telephone subscribers may soon be modified and customised for each Lok Sabha constituency being contested by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

An effort is being made to record the message with an important change — with Mr. Vajpayee identifying the party candidate and telling the subscribers that the candidate is his man.

"The problem is that we know Vajpayeeji is very popular. How do we transfer that popularity to our candidates? One way, we thought, was to send Vajpayeeji's telephonic message with an added appeal for the particular candidate in that constituency," a senior party leader disclosed.

* * *

The BJP is definitely not rattled by the entry of the Congress president, Sonia Gandhi's son, Rahul Gandhi, in the Lok Sabha fray.

A senior leader said: "Let them bring Priyanka (Rahul's sister) also. You see, the Gandhi-Nehru bhoot (ghost) no longer bothers the people; it is years since that craze has disappeared. But the fact is that the Nehru-Gandhi name continues to haunt the Congress. And this situation will continue for decades."

* * *

The BJP president, Venkaiah Naidu, had just finished introducing the new party member, M. Raajhendhran, chairman and managing director of Raj TV and owner of popular television channels in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and elsewhere.

Mr. Raajhendhran then presented shawls to Mr. Naidu and the party general secretary, Pramod Mahajan.

As news cameramen and television crew jostled to grab visuals, Mr. Naidu quipped: "Shawl-giving is a custom in Tamil Nadu. And for you, anyone who publishes the best picture tomorrow, I will give you a shawl."

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