UPCC office gets facelift as Cong gets poll ready

LUCKNOW: The Congress workers who had assembled at the UP Congress Committee (UPCC) office on Wednesday broke into celebrations as soon as the appointment of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra as AICC general secretary for Uttar Pradesh (east) was announced on Wednesday.

At that time, majority of senior Congress leaders were at the airport to welcome Congress president Rahul Gandhi who was on way to his parliamentary constituency Amethi.

After Rahul left for Amethi, the party leaders and workers assembled at the UPCC office to celebrate the development by distributing sweets. According to party leaders, Rahul and Priyanka will launch the party’s poll campaign from the Ramabai Ambedkar Maidan in the first week of February.

“For the last one week, renovation work was going on at the UPCC office, popularly known as Nehru Bhawan. We thought that the facelift was being given in view of Lok Sabha elections. Today, we came to know that Priyanka ji will monitor the election campaign from the UPCC office,” Surendra Sharma, a Congress worker, said. Another Congress worker claimed that the Congress’s ‘war room’ for the Lok Sabha election would be run from UPCC office.

“The halls and rooms located on the first floor of the building have been spruced up for the management of election campaign. Priyanka will visit UP in the first week of February. New furniture has been brought in for the big occasion,” he said.

After consecutive electoral reverses in the 2014 Lok Sabha and 2017 UP assembly elections, the Congress office, which was inaugurated by former PM Indira Gandhi on December 3, 1979, used to wear a deserted look.Congress leader Virendra Madan said the party workers were waiting for the arrival of newly-appointed general secretaries Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Jyotiraditya Scindia who would be given a grand welcome.“The party cadre is ready for the 2019 battle as Rahul and Priyanka are set to lead the campaign,” he said.