Thursday, June 25, 2009

India Retold: BJP: THIS TIME IT IS DIFFERENT

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    • Maggi sauces continue to remain popular with that "It's different" line, thanks to some great ads starring Javed Jaffery, backed by great sauces that retain their edge in quality and taste over the many copycat products that have hit the market since.

    • These days, the BJP is being called "a party with differences", "a party no different", "a different kind of BJP", "the party with no difference", "still a party with a difference" etc.
    • the PM-who-is-no-longer-even-in-the-waiting-list. He too is now blaming the use of wrong ingredients in an out of date product for the dismal performance. He has conveniently forgotten that he had focused mostly on how bad the other sauce was, and not how good and "different" his was. People already knew how bad the other one was; they wanted to hear how much better BJP's "different" offering was in real terms; what they got instead was the smug mug of the mazboot CEO everywhere, doing little more than running his competent and compelling competitor down.
    • Ideas are coming in thick and fast. Some are suggesting that the party should revert to the original tomato sauce formula that the Congress is sticking to, while others are warning that it should not even think of dumping the "different" base that is its USP. As always, there are those who advise a broad cautious middle path by suggesting that while the base should not be thrown away, its proportion should be so reduced that only those with the most sensitive of tongues can detect its taste, and those who are allergic to it do not get any reaction and be put off for ever.
    • Why instead can't he and others see that powerful scientists working on product development in their R&D Headquarters in Nagpur and centres elsewhere still dress like the British and some of their subjects used to over a century ago? With that dress code, how can the mindset change, and a contemporary product conceived, much less produced? Can't they see that the Congress - smart guys - did away with a separate R&D Wing altogether in 1948, the moment Gandhi died?
    • With nothing "different" left, life will become boring once again. Till someone inevitably puts together a political "Nirma" to take on the might of "Surf"; the cycle will then begin again.