150 BJP leaders hit the road, target 2.75 crore Bihari migrants
Armed with 14 questions, seeking names to professions and party loyalty of migrants, BJP hopes to convince them to return in time for vote – with Chhath Puja an added bonus
Prime Minister Narendra Modi address a meeting of Bihar BJP leaders in Patna. (Facebook) 
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Months after it began its outreach to migrant Biharis, the BJP has devised a novel way to step up its efforts to connect with them in a bid to persuade them to return home and vote in the upcoming state Assembly polls.
As a part of this new exercise, about 150 state BJP leaders, armed with a list of 14 questions, have been travelling through the country in order to reach out to non-resident Biharis, who are estimated to number around 2.75 crore.
According to Bihar BJP spokesperson Manoj Sharma, the possibility of migrant Biharis returning to the state to vote is high as the polls are likely to be held in October this year, around the Chhath Puja, one of the main festivals of the state, during which the state sees a return of lakhs of migrants.
“With special trains being run during Chhath Puja, it would be all the more easier for them to travel back to Bihar and cast their votes,” he told The Indian Express.
The questionnaire, titled “Aam Bihari pravisiyon ki jaankari (information on common migrants from Bihar)” accessed by The Indian Express, aims to collect details of the Bihari migrants like name, phone number, address, profession, social category, Assembly segment, native district and also if he / she is a BJP supporter. To assess a migrant’s ability to convince others to vote in favour of the BJP, a question related to the person’s influence back home features in the list.
While one of the questions also seek the details of the voter IDs so that the party could help a migrant get it if that person does not have one, a BJP leader calls the entire exercise a “game changer”. “The questionnaire also helps us get Assembly constituency-wise data to work with. Also, the caste data will help us identify our focus areas keeping in mind the social composition of each constituency,” he said.
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Claiming that the exercise is a follow-up of the party’s drive held during Bihar Divas celebrations earlier this year to convince non-resident Biharis to return and vote, Sharma said, “We have a rough list of all 243 Assembly constituencies, which have between 15,000-20,000 migrants each. Even if we convince 5,000 from each seat to return and vote, it will improve the turnout.”
The BJP had appointed its general secretary Tarun Chugh and senior leader Dushyant Kumar Gautam to oversee the 11-day Bihar Divas celebrations in March, where the party reached out to non-resident Biharis by organising “get-together events”.
According to sources, the collected data is being processed and would be uploaded on an app once it is finalised by August. “The next step would be to call the non-resident Biharis to know if they would return to cast their vote,” a source said.
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