Poll script ready, BJP casts stars

Flash bulbs popped as photographers craned over one another’s head to catch BJP’s new star-acquisitions — a filmstar, a TV st...

Flash bulbs popped as photographers craned over one another’s head to catch BJP’s new star-acquisitions — a filmstar, a TV star and a cricket star — on their cameras. A little later, the stars, Suresh Oberoi, Mahabharata’s Yudhishthir Gajendra Chauhan and Navjot Singh Sindhu, were hijacked by the TV crew hungry for more sound bytes.

In the feel-good season, party’s oven-fresh stuff, rather than party chief M. Venkaiah Naidu and party general secretary Pramod Mahajan, was a better proposition for the instant-media.

Sidhu was far more articulate though they all parroted the same theme of how the BJP is the only party which can take the nation forward. He said: ‘‘Vajpayee can convert weakness into strength, destruction into triumph and obstacles into stepping stones. The BJP has an outstanding leadership.’’

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Oberoi talked of Vajpayee’s leadership, but reporters were more interested his actor-son Vivek Oberoi and Aishwarya Rai. ‘‘Are they also joining BJP?’’ someone asked. ‘‘It is for them to decide,’’ Oberoi said.

Jeetendra, who had missed the date during the day, joined BJP separately at Naidu’s residence in the evening. He said: ‘‘I will campaign for BJP under Vajpayee.’’

On the star-studded day, however, nobody noticed the entry of former Madhya Pradesh CM Govind Narain Singh into BJP.

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