BJP eyes record, not just victory, as bigwigs gather in Varanasi
ministers of the Union cabinet are camping in the holy city of Varanasi where Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a candidate. Their aim is to break the record for a victory margin in a seat Modi won by a margin of 371,785 votes defeating the Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Kejriwal in 2014.
While Railway Minister Piyush Goyal has been camped in Varanasi with UP Health Minister Sidharth Nath Singh and Power Minister Shrikant Sharma since May 13, Wednesday saw External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj in Kashi for four hours to flag off a large scooter rally (for women) in favour of Modi. On Thursday, Information and Broadcasting Minister Rajyavardhan Rathore arrived in the constituency for door-to-door campaigning and Minister of State for External Affairs General V K Singh is to join the battle on the last day.
Although the BJP is fighting hard to create electoral space in West Bengal, the party has not lost sight of its premium constituency with its president Amit Shah finetuning strategies. Shah flew down to Varanasi after the North Kolkata roadshow at midnight and then left for Delhi for the press conference in protest of TMC violence at 3.00am. Modi himself criss-crosses Kashi airport virtually every day and keeps in touch with the political mood in Varanasi.
Goyal, Singh and Sharma are in charge of “sampark” meetings; a total of 100 are scheduled between May 13 and May 17. The ministers are using these meetings to engage with various communities and business groups and urging them to garner maximum votes for Modi.
The roadshow of Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Wednesday evening for party candidate Ajay Rai was well-attended, but no one seriously expects him to win. The camp of the Mahagatbandhan’s candidate Shalini Yadav wears a deserted look. At one sampark meeting, the focus is on the work Modi has done for his constituency.