Bharatiya Janata Party president Rajnath Singh launched his election campaign for the lucknow lok Sabha seat by announcing to take forward the dreams of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
“I will fulfill the dream of Vajpayee to make lucknow, the city of Nawabs, a bio-tech city and also make the Gomti river pollution-free as he had wished, and continue the efforts made by lalji Tandon in this direction,’’ Singh told reporters here on Wednesday.
He said that the best way to make Gomti pollution-free was by adopting the river linking policy mooted by the National Democratic Alliance Government. “If we link Gomti with Sharda, it will help in removing the pollution to some extent,” he added.
“lucknow is the ‘karmabhoomi’ of Atalji and it has been nursed by Tandonji and now I will take over to fulfill peoples’ aspiration,” Singh said. BJP MP from lucknow, lalji Tandon, and old associate of Atalji, Shiv Kumar, were also present at the press conference.
Singh also tried to clarify the confusion over his contesting from lucknow and denial of ticket to Tandon. “The Central Election Committee of the party has decided all the tickets, including the lucknow seat for me. A few months back, Tandonji had spoken to me and had offered the seat to me and I accepted the offer,” he said.
A few days back, a sulking Tandon had told media persons that he would not leave his seat for anyone except Narendra Modi. Earlier, Singh was accorded a warm welcome at the airport on his arrival from New Delhi. Senior party leaders including lalji Tandon and state BJP president laxmikant Bajpai were present to welcome him. The BJP president was also given reception at different places in the state capital on his way to his residence at Kalidas Marg.
Singh would be staying in the state capital for the next two days and is expected to hold a meeting of with the district party workers and leaders on Thursday at the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh headquarters in Niralanagar. He is expected to return to New Delhi on Friday evening.