It would be a show of strength for Bharatiya Janata Party and Samajwadi Party on Thursday as leaders of both the parties would hold rallies in eastern Uttar Pradesh with Narendra Modi addressing people in Gorakhpur and Mulayam Singh Yadav in Varanasi, setting the tone and tenor for the lok Sabha elections.
It would be the sixth rally of both BJP and SP in the State in the run-up to the lok Sabha elections. The earlier rallies of both the parties have been successful. Realising that the path to Delhi passes through Uttar Pradesh, both the parties are going full throttle to win the maximum number of seats from the State. Uttar Pradesh is home to 20 crore people and has the maximum number, 80, of lok Sabha seats.
This would be Narendra Modi’s first rally in 2014. He will share dais with party’s national president Rajnath Singh and local MP and Mahant of Goraksh Peeth, Yogi Adityanath. The stage from where Modi will deliver his speech will be a replica of Gorakhpeeth temple. The rally will be held at Maanbela Grounds which can accommodate five lakh people.
“There is unprecedented enthusiasm among the people of 10 districts. They will pour into the Maanbela grounds to listen to Modi, who is expected to talk about local issues like Government failure to control encephalitis and clear the payment of cane growers,” BJP State spokesman Vijay Bahadur Pathak said here on Wednesday.
The Gorakhpur rally is important for BJP’s electoral fortunes because out of 13 lok Sabha seats in its region, the party holds – Gorakhpur, Bansgaon and Azamgarh. Besides, of the region’s 62 Assembly seats, the BJP won only eight in the 2012 election.