Prime Minister Narendra Modi filed his nomination papers as Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate for the ongoing Lok Sabha elections on Tuesday, seeking his third consecutive win from Varanasi parliamentary seat.
He submitted papers in ‘pushya nakshatra’ on the auspicious day of Ganga Saptami before the Returning Officer, S Rajalingam. Before reaching the Collectorate premises, Modi showed solidarity among the partners of National Democratic Alliance (NDA) ahead of the last three phases of elections.
As most of the parliamentary constituencies of this region, including the entire Purvanchal (eastern UP) and adjoining Bihar areas, will go to polls in these phases, this NDA unity will be crucial, especially as caste equations and social engineering factors play a decisive role in election results.
Modi was accompanied by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, and proposers Ganeshwar Shastri Dravid, Baijnath Patel, Lalchand Kushwaha, and Sanjay Sonkar.
Shastri is a leading scholar who had determined the time for the Ram temple consecration in Ayodhya while Baijnath Patel is a worker dating back to the Jan Sangh period. Kushwaha and Sonkar are also BJP workers belonging to OBC and Dalit communities, respectively.
Prior to reaching the Collectorate premises and meeting with NDA partners, Modi visited Dashaswamedh Ghat and offered prayers amidst the chanting of Vedic mantras by member of Kashi Vishwanath Temple Trust K Venkat Raman Ghanpathy, three priests from Tamil Nadu and one each from Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.
He then reached Namo Ghat by cruise and went to Kal Bhairav Temple, known as ‘Kashi Ke Kotwal’, by road and performed ‘aarti’ as he did in his previous elections in 2014 and 2019. At the temple gate, the CM presented an ‘angavastram’ to the PM amidst the showering of flowers and slogans of ‘Har Har Mahadev’ by locals.
BJP UP president Chaudhary Bhupendra Singh was also present there. On Monday night after culminating his successful roadshow, Modi had sought the blessings at  Kashi Vishwanath Temple for BJP’s landslide victory .
Before going to file nomination, the PM met  national BJP president Jagat Prakash Nadda, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, BJP state chief Bhupendra Chaudhary, Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde, Union ministers Ramdas Athawale, and Hardeep, TDP president Chandrababu Naidu, Praful Patel, LJP chief Chirag Paswan, Bihar ex-CM Jitan Ram Manjhi of Hindustani Awam Morcha, Upendra Kushwaha of Rashtriya Lok Samata Party, Lok Dal president Jayant Choudhary, Apna Dal (S) chief Anupriya Patel,  Sanjay Nishad of Nishad Party, Om Prakash Rajbhar of SBSP, sitting MP Pashupati Paras, and Anil Baluni from Uttarakhand.