Monday was a day of embarrassment for BJP president Amit Shah and his followers in Chennai. Hours before the saffron brigade’s strong man could land in Chennai, Twitterati were busy trending the hashtag #GoBackAmitShah. It reached almost 120,000 tweets by 3pm after Shah began his engagements with a meeting on East Coast Road in Chennai.
Amit Shah landed in Chennai at 11.15am on Monday to meet his party men and brainstorm with them on preparations for the 2019 parliamentary election. The meeting, organised on the outskirts of Chennai at Golden Beach Resorts, is the first of its kind in Chennai and Tamil Nadu where Shah is expected to spell out strategies for the BJP, which is trying hard to find a foothold in the state. In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, the BJP, in a rainbow alliance, won from Nagercoil.
In the 2016 Assembly polls, though the BJP passionately sought to forge an alliance with the AIAMDK, Jayalalithaa was strongly opposed to it and forced the saffron party to go it alone. The BJP candidate in the recent R.K. Nagar bypoll held in December 2017 polled much less than the NOTA votes and lost his deposit.
The BJP, which has conquered almost 13 states in the north and the northeast and which came close to capturing power in Karnataka recently, has been strategising for the past five years to expand the party's influence in Tamil Nadu. The ‘missed call’ membership drive too did not yield a significant result for the party.
At this time, Shah’s visit to Chennai is considered very crucial as expectations of both senior BJP leaders and the party cadres are high. Shah is all set to meet party functionaries at various levels from booth level to constituency level and is expected to roll out an action plan for the BJP in Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Andaman and Nicobar Islands to win elections.
The Tamil Nadu region of the BJP has already set up Shakthi Kendras and Maha Shakthi Kendras to begin working from the booth level during the Lok Sabha polls. In Tamil Nadu, one Shakthi Kendra of the BJP will work for five polling booths in one constituency, and six Shakthi Kendras together will form a Maha Shakthi Kendra.
According to reports, 13,056 functionaries have been nominated to Shakthi Kendras and 2,750 functionaries have been nominated to Maha Shakthi Kendras. While Shah will not discuss the setting up of alliances, his visit will aim to strategise on working at the ground level.
In April this year, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to Chennai to inaugurate Defence Expo 2018, the opposition DMK took to the streets and held black flag protests. Then, #GoBackModi trended on Twitter, making the prime minister tunnel through the IIT campus at Guindy in Chennai to reach a cancer hospital venue for an event.
This time, though there are no black flags for Shah, the hashtag has turned out to be an embarrassment not just for the BJP president but for the saffron party, which is trying to find a foothold in Tamil Nadu, pushing down the two major Dravidian parties.