Maha electoral office cautious about picking film stars as campaigners

Rinku Rajguru and Aakash Thosar

The Maharashtra Electoral Office is being cautious in selecting film personalities as brand ambassadors for polls after a recent experience of two such faces joined a political party, an official said Wednesday.

The electoral office does not want any actor with political affiliation to be chosen as a brand ambassador. While many Marathi film stars are associated either with Shiv Sena or the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), Bollywood actors too are known for their political affiliations.

A recent case in point is that of Marathi actors Aakash Thosar and Rinku Rajguru, famously known as "Parsha" and "Archie" after the characters they had played in blockbuster Marathi movie "Sairat". Recently, Thosar and Rajguru, along with Sairat director Nagraj Manjule, joined the MNS which is headed by Raj Thackeray. They were last year roped in as the brand ambassadors to commemorate the National voters Day on January 25 to attract youngsters to register themselves as voters.

"Most of the well-known Marathi stars are associated either with the Shiv Sena or the MNS. Even top Hindi superstars are seen close to certain political parties. The Election Commission has to maintain its neutrality and hence we have to chose well known faces carefully," said the official from the office of the Maharashtra Chief Electoral Officer.

He said Thosar and Rajguru are the perfect choice to attract future voters. "Rajguru herself is a future voter, as she is not yet completed 18 years (the minimum age to register oneself as a voter in the country)," he said.

The official said the Electoral Office is looking forward to rope in sportspersons to attract youngsters to enroll themselves as voters for the ongoing special summary revision of the electoral rolls. "Earlier, we worked with actor Mrinal Kulkarni, scientist Anil Kakodkar, social worker Prakash Amte, eye specialist T P Lahane," he said.

The special summary revision began on September 1 this year and will continue till October 31. The rolls will be published in January 2019. While the Lok Sabha polls are due in May 2019 the assembly elections in Maharashtra are slated for October next year.

Maharashtra has added more than 13.6 lakh voters since the 2014 assembly elections, taking the total to nearly 8.49 crore. The rise in voter count was reflected in the latest revision of electoral rolls in Maharashtra, the second most populous state in the country. Post the revision which was done in February this year, the total voter count stood at 8,48,96,357 in Maharashtra.

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