Guwahati, May 17: BJP spin doctor Pramod Mahajan is setting up a network of 1.5 lakh activists to maintain day-to-day contact with the Assam electorate in the run-up to the Assembly elections next year.

The move is a corollary to the party?s decision to focus on Assam, which is one of the four states where polls are round the corner.

Mahajan, who has been appointed the BJP?s election in-charge for Assam, has asked the party?s state unit to set up 11-member committees for each booth. ?Workers were hitherto assigned to booths only on the day of polling, their task being restricted to distributing voters? slips. The party will now involve them in grassroots-level campaigning much ahead of the elections,? a BJP leader said.

Mahajan?s brief for the proposed committees is to identify areas of weakness and devise strategies to win over the electorate in consultation with the district-level observers.

The basic idea, the BJP leader said, was to turn the campaign virtually upside down.

?The general practice has been simple so far ? senior leaders identify issues and work out strategies, while grassroots-level workers implement these. The new formula is to allow the workers to identify issues and suggest strategies,? he said.

Mahajan is ostensibly convinced that there is no issue of relevance to the entire state apart from illegal migration. He believes the party has to find local issues for each constituency.

An election observer has been appointed for every district to keep tabs on the committees.

These observers will also prepare poll guides containing information such as the break-up of voters in a particular booth, issues of relevance to each area and the party?s strengths and weaknesses.

Sources said Mahajan had stressed the importance of unity among those in the upper echelons of the BJP?s state unit.

The party has formed a 40-member group of MPs and organising secretaries to pre-empt bickering in the run-up to the elections, as was the case during the Lok Sabha polls.

Eight of the party?s central leaders, including former minister Kalraj Mishra, Gujarat strongman S. Gandhi and national vice-president T. Gehlot, are already camping in the state. Mahajan will be visiting the state regularly from June.