PM’spollcampaignfrom BJP’slostground, Alwar
GEARING UP Modi will kickstart party campaign for assembly elections on November 25 JAIPUR:Prime
Minister Narendra Modi will begin his Rajasthan campaign for the December 7 assembly election on November 25 from Alwar, where the BJP lost the Lok Sabha by-elections held in February this year. This will be Modi’s first public meeting in Rajasthan after the announcement of the assembly election.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won all 25 parliamentary seats in 2014 general election but lost two – Alwar and Ajmer – in the by-elections held following the death of incumbent MPs.
The PM was in Ajmer on the day the assembly election was announced on October 6 when the party organised ‘Vijay Sankalp’ rally to mark the conclusion of chief minister Vasundhara Raje’s Rajasthan Gaurav Yatra. People from Tonk, Bhilwara, Nagaur and Jaipur districts attended the PM’s Ajmer rally.
According to information from the state BJP office, Modi will land in Alwar around noon on Sunday and address a public meeting at Vijay Nagar ground. People from all 11 assembly constituencies of the district will attend the rally.
Alwar is an important district for the BJP after the party lost all eight assembly segments of the Alwar Lok Sabha seat in the bypolls. In 2014, the BJP won seven of these. Due to the by-election rout, the party dropped six of the legislators for the assembly election on December 7. However, sons of two dropped legislators have been given ticket.
One of the dropped MLAs, Gyandev Ahuja, filed his paper as an independent candidate from Sanganer in Jaipur in protest but withdrew from the contest after his meeting with BJP national president Amit Shah in Jaipur on Thursday. On Friday, the party appointed him as the state vice-president.
Alwar superintendent of police Rajendra Singh said police were finalising security arrangements for PM’s visit on November 25.
“We are conducting door-todoor survey, maintaining vigil on the meeting venue through drones and monitoring entry points to the city through barricades,” he said.
The district BJP unit is targeting a crowd of 100,000 for the PM’s public meeting. However, state intellgigence officers who visited the city to take stock of the security arrangements on Thursday said the ground’s capacity was around 30,000.
The PM is scheduled to visit Kota on November 26. Kota city superintendent of police Deepak Bhargava said that the PM will hold a public meeting at the Dussehra mela grounds in the city. Kota district BJP president Hemant Vijayvargiya said that the meeting will be held around 1.30pm.
Meanwhile, chief minister Vasundhara Raje will also kick off her campaign from tomorrow, addressing seven meetings in five districts on Friday.