Highpitched Sunday sets tone for endgame
MODI IN VARANASI PM camping in the ancient city for three days now, Akhilesh, Rahul too concentrate their campaign in the region
Campaigning for the seventh and final phase of Uttar Pradesh assembly elections on March 8 reached fever pitch on Sunday, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s parliamentary constituency Varanasi remaining the focal point in the endgame.
Modi has been camping in the ancient city for three days — from morning till night — and will stay overnight in Varanasi. Originally, campaigning was to end on Monday, but in Alapur, where BJP president Amit Shah held a rally on Sunday, it will end on Tuesday.
Voting in Alapur constituency, which would have gone to polls in the fifth phase, was moved to March 9 following the death of a candidate.
Chief architects of the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance, chief minister Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi, too have concentrated their campaign in Varanasi region.
Akhilesh targeted Modi’s road shows in the state at one of his rallies, saying, “Who takes a retest? One who fails the first time. Modi ji’s first road show failed, so he is taking out another road show. The second too will fail and then he will take out one more.”
Around the same time, Shah mocked Akhilesh at a rally in Alapur over the rape allegation against SP minister Gayatri Prajapati. “The chief minister says he has asked the rape accused Gayatri Prajapati to surrender.
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