BJP National President and Union Minister JP Nadda with Union Ministers Chirag Paswan and Jitan Ram Manjhi, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and JDU National Working President Sanjay Jha releases the National Democratic Alliance's (NDA) manifesto for the Bihar Assembly elections, in Patna
Credit: PTI Photo
New Delhi: An election manifesto serves as a defining document for a political party, outlining its goals and promises to voters. With time, the manifestos have evolved from conventional statements to policy-specific documents.
The function to release the BJP manifesto in Bihar took less than a minute. The Congress said it concluded in 26 seconds.
NDA functionaries defend the 'quick' release of the manifesto, citing their leaders’ campaign engagements during the day and their confidence in the people’s belief in the coalition's ability to deliver good governance and development in the state.
Election strategists—both hired professionals and partymen—say times have changed and a large chunk of voters no longer look at the larger picture and are only bothered about their immediate and personal needs.
One needs to communicate with them directly, as their attention span is low, they say.
Abbin Theepura, founder of political strategy firm ‘P-MARQ’, said traditional manifestos no longer attract a large number of voters and as a political communicator, it is a necessity that you need to coin slogans and promises that have a 'recall value'.
“Voters wanted roads and drinking water earlier. Now, it is free WiFi and/or free power. You need to tell them what you want to say in fewer words. So, an innovation came in the form of say guarantees. Parties use several methods to showcase their vision. Manifestoes are a repetition of some of the promises made earlier as well as new ones to woo vote banks,” he told DH.
Amitabh Dubey, a senior Congress strategist who was part of the sub-committee that drafted the I.N.D.I.A bloc’s joint manifesto for Bihar, however, gives a premium to manifestos but acknowledges that communicating to individual voter is important.
Congress has prepared individual manifestos for its 61 candidates in Bihar by highlighting 7-8 hyperlocal points besides the joint manifesto.
“But the BJP does not seem to consider it an important document. You could predict UPA’s policy trajectory— RTI, MGNREGA, Aadhaar, Food Security Act etc—from its manifesto, but that’s not the case with NDA. Demonetisation was not in their manifesto. In 2019, the BJP had nothing in its manifesto on corporate tax cuts, but implemented it four months later. That is the difference between UPA and NDA manifestos,” he told DH.
With micro-level targeting the norm for electioneering, poll strategists claim that they cannot use the methods of older days when people used to wait for manifestos, which was more of sloganeering. Grabbing the attention of the voter closer to the election is important, they say.
“There is a section that still looks at manifestos, but their numbers are shrinking. Earlier, manifestos were steered by a lot of discussions with people, civil society, etc. We still go through that grind,” said Vaibhav Walia, who is part of Congress’ Bihar war room and earlier headed the party’s national communications war room during the Lok Sabha polls.
He said people now go by the 'overall feel good factor' and not on the larger questions of governance. He also believes 'hidden manifestos' create social and communal unrest and take away attention from manifestos.