Silencing all the rivals and virtually converting this holy city in saffron colours on Sunday evening, prime minister Narendra Modi has sent a clear message that in his parliamentary constituency he is still a mighty and unparallel ‘hero’. It was second continuous day and probably rare in the history of India politics that any PM took out two massive road shows within a couple of days. If he passed through old city areas in the morning hours on first day, he responded to the people attempting to make close connect with them in the evening hours.
Unlike the first one which was not official road-show as the BJP claimed that it was just ‘temple-darshan yatra’, it was the show for which the party had taken permission from the administration though BJP termed this one too as ‘janata-darshan yatra’ instead of road-show. In the manner the people turned out from their homes in the trans-Varuna areas, it indicated that the PM had succeeded in sending the messages he wanted to give the voters not only in the city but also in the entire Varanasi and Vindhyachal divisions comprising 40 assembly seats which would go to the polls on March 8.
Never in the history of this millennia old city when any PM was seen moving in such manner on the roads except Rajiv Gandhi while he was attending the funeral procession of Pt Kamlapati Tripathi in late 1990s but too was the areas of old city. Contrary to last show, it was well organized as the Modi’s motorcade was piloted by hundreds of the youth workers riding on bikes carrying cut-outs of Modi as well as his lieutenant Amit Shah. It was a tough time for the security personnel to control the unexpected turn-out of crowds. Surprisingly, in this road-show the slogans like Har, Har Mahadev, Jai Siaram and other rented the air.
Earlier, Modi’s copter landed at the Police lines and he was scheduled to begin his road-show from Pandeypur crossing but due to huge rush Modi took nearly one hour to reach there after coming out from the Police lines. Throughout the roads, stream of people thronged the roadsides and thousands were presented on rooftops of the buildings from where the residents were raining petals of flowers and Modi himself responded with flying hands continuously and throwing petals on the people, amidst the echoing slogans of ‘Har Har Modi, Ghar Ghar Modi’.
After passing through Hukulganj, inhabitants with mixed population, the road-show was started more than one hour late than the scheduled time and around 6.30 p.m. when it reached Chowkaghat crossing, thousands o BJP workers and others waiting for him for hours, started raising slogans in favour of Modi turning the entire atmosphere in saffron colours. Then after passing through Teliabagh, the motorcade reached Maldahiya crossing where the PM garlanded the statue of Sardar Patel. It was the same place from where Modi had started his nomination procession in 2014 parliamentary elections. later, Modi addressed a meeting at nearby Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapeeth (MGKV) grounds before going to DlW for his scheduled meeting with a section of intellectuals.