Rahul Gandhi to begin UP poll campaign with ‘Khat Sabha’ today
LUCKNOW : Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will begin his Uttar Pradesh poll campaign from Deoria in eastern UP on Tuesday.In a bid to reinvigorate Congress and end its 27-year exile from power in the politically important state in the upcoming Assembly polls, Rahul will embark on the 2500 km-long Kisan Yatra from Deoria.
“My yatra from Deoria to Delhi starting September 6 is a campaign to secure the rights of the poor, farmers and labourers in government resources,” Rahul’s office said in a tweet.The ‘Deoria to Dilli yatra’, which will start from Panchlari Kritpura village, will be marked by a door-to-door campaign of collecting ‘Kisan Mangpatras’ (charters of farmers demands), one-to-one interaction with farmers through Khaat (cot) Sabhas, a concept similar to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Chai Pe Charcha’ during the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, and roadside meetings.
Rahul will also hold road shows at various places during the yatra. On the first two days, Rahul will cover Kushinagar, Gorakhpur, Sant Kabirnagar and Basti besides Deoria. The party has made preparations for making the Congress leader’s longest yatra in the state a success. A team of national spokesmen will also be stationed in Lucknow to apprise media of the developments.
Rahul and Congress seemed to have learnt a lesson from the humiliating defeat in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. One of the reasons given by Antony report was felt that Congress’s Muslim outreach has alienated the Hindu voters and the party had suffered an image of being an appeasement party.
So Rahul will begin his Yatra on Tuesday which is considered to be a holy day for Hindus and from Kashipur also called Chota Kashi Behind this campaign is also political strategist Prashant Kishor’s formula that Congress could bounce back if Brahmins are wooed. The last Brahmin chief minister from the state was Nd Tewari and this was precisely the rationale behind making Sheila Dikshit the chief ministerial face. (With PTI inputs)
