Hindustan Times (Lucknow)

YOGI CHARGES UP POLL FRENZY IN HP CM BATTLEFIEL­D

- Vivek Gupta vivek.gupta@hindustant­imes.com ▪

ARKI (SOLAN): Emerging as a new hot spot after chief minister Virbhadra Singh decided to contest election from here, Solan’s Arki segment reverberat­ed with poll slogans on Sunday when the BJP’s firebrand Hindu face and UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath launched a fierce attack against the Congress on corruption issue. Yogi’s rally at Jainagar village came hours after Virbhadra hit his campaign trail for the first time in Darlaghat.

ARKI (SOLAN): Emerging as a new hot spot after chief minister Virbhadra Singh decided to contest election from here, Solan’s Arki segment reverberat­ed with poll slogans on Sunday when the BJP’s firebrand Hindu face and Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath launched a fierce attack against the Congress on corruption issue.

Yogi’s rally at Jainagar village, 50km from Arki town, came hours after Virbhadra hit his campaign trail for the first time in Darlaghat.

“If the Gandhi family has brought something from Italy (Sonia Gandhi’s birthplace), then it is the word mafia.

The sand mafia, forest mafia and drug mafia plundered the ‘Dev Bhoomi’ in the five-year Congress rule.

“What else can we expect from Rahul Gandhi whose party faces defeat wherever he campaigns,” he said (evoking laughter from the crowd).

He said the CM could not utilise the central grants during his tenure even as projects worth ₹40,000 crore were approved.

Yogi said the state was plagued by broken roads, water scarcity, bad roads and poor health services. He urge people to vote for the party’s first-time candidate Rattan Pal Singh. “The history is going to repeat itself in Arki too. People will vote for the poor farmer’s son and not ones who live in castles,” said Yogi.

LOCAL VS OUTSIDER

BJP candidate from the segment Rattan Singh Pal (50), a vegetable trader, said, “I am born and brought up here and will always remain with you.

But this raja will never come back once the election is over. He even does not know the names of villages.”

 ?? HT ?? CM Yogi Adityanath at a rally in Solan on Sunday.
HT CM Yogi Adityanath at a rally in Solan on Sunday.
 ?? RAVI KUMAR/HT ?? ▪ Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath along with BJP’s Arki candidate Rattan Singh Pal (right) and the sitting MLA Govind Thakur during a party rally at Jainagar village in Solan on Sunday.
RAVI KUMAR/HT ▪ Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath along with BJP’s Arki candidate Rattan Singh Pal (right) and the sitting MLA Govind Thakur during a party rally at Jainagar village in Solan on Sunday.

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