SMART FUND RAISING

BIKASH CHOUDHURY


Reaching out to 800 million electorates in 2014 general election and
for three state assemblies prove to be a Herculean task for the top
National & Regional Political parties in the country whose numbers
could be between 50-100. If the task was not difficult enough the fund
raising to meet the cost of reaching out to voters in the election
season makes the task really daunting and certainly not for the
chicken hearted. Earlier Political parties raised funds from their
members, legislatures, parliamentarians and business houses; but, now
the demand for political funds is far out stripping the supply with
mushrooming of political parties. AAP, the first political party in
the country which is following the foot steps of USA by organizing the
fund raising with 'dinner' with its top leader. There can be other
innovative and socially appropriate methods of Political Fund Rasing
in a transparent manner; however, copy & paste and reverse engineering
have now been the forte of Indians and Chinese. Here I wish to toast a
novel method of Political Fund Rasing which could also be equally
appealing to the donors.

                                                  Political Parties
could now raise substantial amount of funds from high net worth
individuals (HNI) and even corporate sector by organizing "Art
Auctions" in collaboration with Art Galleries in the city with little
amount of connoisseur foods, drinks-preferably non-alcoholic and some
soul melting music thrown in combo. And, donors would gleefully open
up their purse strings to collect 'donor passes' paying a decent sum
of money and also signing cheques generously for owning the master
pieces of art by bidding boisterously over a good drink while keeping
their inflated egos in their wallet inside pocket. I am sure Political
Parties (with followings in the classes & masses) would go all the way
to the bank laughingly. In fact Political Parties could kill three
birds with one stone. Connect with people in a creative way while
sharing the message of the party among the connoisseurs of art and at
the same time they would help finance the Artist community in our
country who are yet to break even due to paucity of a vibrant art
market and last but not the least; the funds collected for the party
could be a real bonus to further spread the message of the party. Any
takers?