The BJP, leaving no stone unturned to make the Parivartan Yatra rally of the party’s national president Amit Shah slated in Haldwani on Wednesday a huge success , has made senior Congress leader and Cabinet Minister Indira Hridayesh edgy. Haldwani is the constituency from where she was elected in the last election. However, she tasted defeat in the 2007 election. Observers say that the state Congress brass and particularly, Hridayesh are keenly watching things. Shah already addressed a rally in Almora on November 22, the place from where the Chief Minister Harish Rawat hails. Shah flagged off the yatra from Dehradun on November 13. However, the party’s focus seems to be trained more on Kumaon than Garhwal as the national president of the party already addressed a rally there and is set to address another one on Wednesday by way winding up the Kumaon leg of the yatra.
There are reasons why the saffron camp is focusing on Kumaon region. It is the region to which the CM belongs. “Harish Rawat is supposed to have a deep connection with the people across the region. To garner majority to form the next government, BJP must secure more seats from there than the Congress. It is still a tough challenge, given the deep roots the CM has struck in the electorate. The fact that most of the party leaders who turned rebels and switched to BJP, including Vijay Bahuguna and Harak Singh Rawat, are from Garhwal division seems to have prodded the wily CM to pay the sentimental card to hook the electorate of the Kumaon region. He is harping on the tune that some rebels from Garhwal ganged up against him to oust him from power. Besides, he is also striving to strike an emotion chord with the people of his region saying that this might be his last electoral battle, given his advancing age, a ploy that might succeed to help him sail through the tough battle ahead of him,” said a state watcher.
Sensing the support the CM has been receiving from the cross-section of the people of the region, state BJP has been ferrying Union ministers one after another to take the wind out of the CM’s sails.
Talking to The Pioneer, state BJP president Ajay Bhatt said that the state BJP in-charge Shyam Jaju had visited MB Inter College to review the preparation. Party has appointed state general secretary Gajraj Singh Bisht the in-charge of the Haldwani rally. Meanwhile, the party MlAs from the constituencies which are segments of the Udham Singh Nagar lok Sabha seat have been entrusted with the task of bringing as many of their supporters as possible.
As things stand now all the four former CMs- Bhagat Singh Koshyari, Maj Gen Bhuwan Chandra Khanduri, Dr Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank and Vijay Bahuguna aside from the former state BJP president Bachi Singh Rawat and other leaders like Puran Chand Sharma, Bishan Singh Chufal and Manohar Kant Dhyani would share the dais with the party’s national president in Haldwani.
Bhatt further claimed that the rally would be a historic one in terms of turnout. “We are expecting that nearly 40,000 people would gather,” he said, a claim that the Congress leaders ridiculed, saying that the saffron party would be lucky to gather 15000 people.
Bhatt said that the response of the people to the party’s yarta for change was overwhelming. “I was moved when many elderly people who used to vote for the Congress told me that they would vote for BJP this time,” he said. He said that so far the yatra had covered 4400 kilometers and would cover 600 kilometers more in the coming few days.