The holy city of Varanasi would soon witness a fight between a chaiwallah and a paanwallah for the lok Sabha seat.
The chaiwallah image of BJP’s prime ministerial candidate has made such an impact that to counter it the Samajwadi Party has launched a campaign centred around maghai paan because party’s candidate Kailash Chaurasia is in fact a paanwallah.
In his attempt to gain sympathy of the poor and weaker sections of society Narendra Modi recently narrated his earlier days when he used to sell tea in a railway station. He talked about his rise from his deprived past to the post of the Guajrat Chief Minister and how he had faced the agony of poverty. The strategy worked and he was able to send the message across.
After the BJP announced Narendra Modi as their candidate from Varanasi parliamentary constituency the local party workers started organising chai chaupal as a part of election campaigning telling voters about Gujrat Chief Minister’s humble past. They are selling Modi’s image as kadak chai.
As BJP’s campaign yielded positive results the SP decided to counter this style of campaigning when its candidate Kailash Chaurasia also started narrating the background of his family. During his election rally he described himself as a paanwala (like Modi projects himself as a chaiwala).
“This paanwalah will make chaiwala bite the dust. You eat paan after chai as a mouth freshner and this taste lingers on. So chai is a short-time phenomena whereas paan is permanent,” SP leaders are saying in their public meetings.
Meanwhilem, the Samajwadi party workers are offering maghai paan, to the people during their poll campaign with a request to vote for maghai paan, Varanasi ki shaan.
Benarasi paan is famous across the world. The leaf is succulent and melts in the mouth giving a nice texture with line and catechu.
Chaurasia’s intention is rather clear, he wants to polarise Chaurasia community in his favour and convey the messages to electorates that he is attached to the ground and would stand up with the weaker sections if he comes to power.
The campaign with chai and paan has made the election campaign interesting for the electorates of this constituency.
Now the time will tell that whether the campaign with ‘paan’ benefits the SP candidate or not as there is over one month for the lok Sabha elections in this constituency.The last phase of polling is scheduled for May 12.