Regional Journal: Influencers in demand

The BJP top brass engaged with digital influencers this week as they marked 11 years of the NDA government. Led by Home Minister Amit Shah, an NDA delegation comprising BJP chief and Health Minister JP Nadda, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, met nearly 230 leaders from the digital world — legacy media houses, standalone properties, new-age content creators and influencers. The BJP strategy stems from data — 95 crore out of 140 crore Indians have Internet access and 71 per cent of them are consuming news online.

Rupani changed his ticket twice

Punjab BJP in-charge Vijay Rupani had not intended to fly to London on June 12 after all. After the former Gujarat Chief Minister died along with other passengers aboard the ill-fated AI 171 Ahmedabad-London flight, it has emerged that Rupani first booked himself to fly to London on May 19 but had to cancel it. He booked again for June 5 and cancelled it. Eventually, he flew out on June 12. His plans kept getting delayed due to the Ludhiana West Assembly byelection.

Anthem against bumpy ride

Just like during the 2020-21 farm stir, when some Punjabi songs became the voice of resistance, singers Gurvinder Brar and Zara Gill have turned a bumpy ride into a protest anthem. Their track, aimed at the Muktsar-Panniwala road at Maha Badhar village in Muktsar, Punjab, echoes local anger: “Maha Badhar nu jaandi, javaa tutt gayi sadak. Hoya pya sarkara da, ta beda hi garak.” There is hope the government will finally take note.

Outrage over outage

Amid scorching heat, frequent unscheduled power outages have left Gurdaspur residents fuming. So much so that they are planning to move court against Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd (PSPCL). Their anger originates from “unattended phone calls and unreachable employees of the powercom”. An influential section of residents say when consumers pay their power bills on time, why can’t PSPCL supply them with proper electricity? There is hope the government will finally take note.

Food for thought, not stomach

Haryana CM Nayab Singh Saini provided enough food for thought to scribes the other day with his over 2-hour press conference on the Modi government’s 11 years in office. The presser was supposed to be followed by breakfast, but by the time it ended, it was already lunch time. Much to the surprise of “empty-stomach” journos, the venue for “breakfast” (or lunch) was 5 km from the press meet location. Clearly, it was food for thought, not stomach!

Embarrassing moment

Call it ignorance or an over-zealous attempt to applaud the Modi government, former Himachal Congress minister-turned-BJP MP Harsh Mahajan ended up embarrassing himself while interacting with mediapersons recently, when he said the Centre’s policies had caused women population to surpass that of men at some places. He seemed ignorant of the fact that the state election commission had recently expressed concern at the voter gender ratio dropping sharply to 820 females per 1,000 males in the Shillai Assembly segment.

Contributed by Aditi Tandon, Archit Watts, Ravi Dhaliwal, Pradeep Sharma and Ambika Sharma

India