KOTTAYAM: Kerala Congress (S) candidate P.C. George is much ahead of his UDF and LDF rivals in Poonjar - in graffitis and flex boards. Mr George had booked all the walls of the constituency much in advance declaring himself as the LDF candidate. In the case of the flex boards, most of them are placed by his sponsors with their ads.
Sources say this is to escape the scanner of the Election Commission, which has put a cap of Rs 28 lakh on the expenses of a candidate. He expects a relaxation on sponsored flexes.
Political opponents say Mr George is using the services of an event management group for this. They also accept that Mr George had maintained his monopoly over the campaigning methods including wall posters, flexes and writings on walls.
“He has entrusted such works with an event management company and is pumping in a lot of money,” Sabu Plathottam, the UDF election convenor, told DC. LDF candidate P.C. Joseph also admits that Mr George is way ahead in such means of campaigning. “He is making maximum use of it. However, such hype will not necessarily make the desired impact,” he told DC.
Sources say Mr George is also employing multi-pronged strategies so as to keep the pace. He has released an album in which a song begins with Muthey PC Georgey.
“He deploys his people to initiate discussions at public places to make it look like he's going to win. He also promotes talks that he's going to make peace with K.M. Mani and a section in the LDF still supports him to confuse LDF voters,” one of them said.
