Ludhiana: With no check on spendings, parties go all out for installing hoardings, banners

The Election Commission is yet to declare the date for holding the bypoll in Ludhiana (West) Constituency but the political parties have geared up and have installed huge number of hoardings, banners and posters all over the constituency to woo the voters. The hoardings, which catch everyone’s immediate attention, are both legal and illegal, but the authorities seem to be least bothered to check the expenditure incurred on the hoardings, and neither they are making any effort to remove the illegal ones.

One of the senior officials of the district administration, however, said that they could not do much in this. “The expenditure part comes when the date of election is announced or the code of conduct is imposed. Before that the parties can spend any amount on advertisements and we really cannot do anything,” said the official, adding that illegal hoardings could be taken care of by the MC only.

At the same time, the interesting wordings on the hoardings are catching the attention of the voters in the constituency. Some of AAP candidate Sanjeev Arora’s hoardings read- “bedaag kirdar, tarakki di raftar, Sanjeev Arora is vaar”, imaandar damdaar, Sanjeev Arora Is Vaar”, na gussa na hankaar, Sanjeev Arora is vaar”, ghar aye da hove maan, naa hove apman, Sanjeev Arora di pehchan”, “Development that won’t rest, Sanjeev Arora for Ludhiana West”, “Lokan nu na bole kaura, is vaar Sanjeev Arora”.

In case of Bharat Bhushan Ashu, the hoardings say ‘for development and trust, Ashu is must’, ‘the change we need, the voice we deserve, Bharat Bhushan Ashu’ and ‘kamman nal badli halke di taqdeer, sadi vote da haqdaar e Ashu veer’. For SAD candidate Paropkar Singh Ghuman , the hoardings say “na bahri na ahankari, is vaar Paropkar di vari”, “tuhade vichon, tuhada apna”.

The hoardings dot the whole of the constituency, but still there has been no assessment as to how much is being spent on the entire advertisement campaign. One of the supporters of AAP said that ruling party always had an edge. “But we will see when the code of conduct comes into force. Until then, there has been no objection and we are paying for the advertisements,” said the supporter.