Why Yogi Adityanath spent 9 days, nights in Gorakhpur this January & February
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath may be governing the biggest state in the country, but his erstwhile Lok Sabha constituency, Gorakhpur, remains right on top of his priority list.
He spent nine days each in January and February in Gorakhpur, accompanied by a team that kept him briefed about happenings in other parts of the state.
Although a member of the UP legislative council now, the Chief Minister is still smarting from the BJP’s loss in the 2018 Lok Sabha bypoll for Gorakhpur, a constituency he has won five times. In the bypoll, the Samajwadi Party candidate, supported by the Bahujan Samaj Party, had won the seat by a margin of around 21,000 votes. As a result, Adityanath finds himself frequently headed for Gorakhpur.
While he was there with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 24 February, when he launched the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (which lays out an annual grant of Rs 6,000 for farmers who own up to two hectares of cultivable land), he has also made it a point to attend fairly nondescript events.
During his visits in February, Adityanath organised janata durbars (a platform to hear public grievances), spent an hour at a gaushala, offered flowers at the memorial of Mahant Avaidyanath, his predecessor as the head priest of the Gorakhnath mutt, and even got children to sit in his helicopter.
Between 13 and 16 of January, Adityanath participated in Makar Sankranti celebrations, and paid tribute at the memorial of revolutionary and freedom fighter Ram Prasad Bismil.
Earlier that month, in two separate trips, the CM distributed blankets and woolen clothes to the poor and participated in a bhoomi puja organised by a nagar panchayat, besides inaugurating a TB hospital.
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Election announcement will unleash a wave of BJP leaders on our TV screens
The BJP is set to unleash a media blitzkrieg in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections that will see its MPs and other leaders address over 1,000 press conferences in the 543 constituencies over the fortnight following the announcement of poll dates.
The idea is to address at least two pressers in each constituency on last week’s air strikes on Jaish-e-Mohammed camps in Pakistan, and the opposition’s alleged attempt to belittle the achievements of the armed forces.
The government’s welfare schemes will be another focal point, with BJP leaders also asked to submit subjects they would like to talk about.
In opposition-ruled states, the BJP leaders will look to expose “failures in governance”.
(Contributors: Aditi Vatsa and Pragya Kaushika)