Jayant to launch ‘selfie with potholes’ campaign, announcement likely soon

Former member of Parliament (MP) and Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) national vice-president Jayant Chaudhary is ready with a plan to launch a novel public campaign to draw the Yogi Adityanath government’s attention and shame the authorities for the crumbling roads and streets in Uttar Pradesh.

Under the campaign that has been named ‘selfie with potholes’, the party workers and common people will be exhorted to click selfies set against the backdrop of gaping potholes on roads and streets and post the same to a particular WhatsApp number/ address to be made public.

The party will then make extensive use of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and WhatsApp, inviting public comments in trying to turn the heat on the government ahead of Lok Sabha polls which are about six months away.

Jayant is expected to announce the launch of the campaign at a press conference in Lucknow in a day or two.

While Jayant Chaudhary was not available for comment, RLD chief Ajit Singh confirmed the party was planning the ‘selfie with potholes’ campaign.

“Jayant will announce the details of the campaign shortly in Lucknow,” he said, refusing to elaborate on the plan.

Sources said Jayant was scheduled to announce the campaign here last week, but he had to cancel the press conference at the 11th hour for some ‘unavoidable circumstances.’

“Jayant Chaudhary will soon announce the ‘selfie with potholes’ campaign to build pressure on the government to fulfill its promise of ridding the roads of potholes,” a senior RLD leader said.

“The campaign will be open for public and we would like as much people’s engagement as possible,” he added.

The idea, he said, was to bring infrastructure gaps to public attention.

“The UP government claims it has filled potholes and is continuing to so regularly. We want to highlight the corrupt practices that are responsible for even the newly laid roads in UP developing cracks all over,” the leader said.

The ‘selfie with potholes’, he said was the new idea which was sure to catch public imagination.

Nationalist Congress Party MP Suprriya Sule had also launched the similar campaign in Maharashtra last year with her selfies with potholes having gone viral, triggering a war of words with the ruling BJP there.

Sometime back in Russia, activists had taken to showing their anger about the poor state of the country’s roads by painting mocking caricatures of local officials over gaping potholes, transforming them into comically grotesque mouths. The campaign is said to have been very successful there.

First Published: Oct 10, 2018 14:32 IST