PM Modi, Rahul Gandhi to spur political heat with UP visit on January 22

Both leaders would visit respective constituencies of Varanasi, Amethi

The political temperature in Uttar Pradesh is set to soar next week, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress president Rahul Gandhi would visit their respective parliamentary constituencies on the same day i.e. January 22.

While, Modi would arrive in Varanasi to formally inaugurate the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) 2019, Gandhi would arrive in Amethi for a two-day visit to the traditional bastion of the Gandhi family. 

Gandhi was earlier slated to visit his parliamentary constituency on January 4. However, it was later postponed, since the party was locked in a fierce debate in Parliament over the Rafale fighter jets deal with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In fact, Gandhi was present in the Lok Sabha till evening on the day, even as defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman replied to the debate on the controversial deal, which Congress alleges is a huge scam.

Union textile minister Smriti Irani had, nonetheless, visited Amethi on January 4 as per her schedule. She had contested against Rahul in the 2014 Lok Sabha poll from Amethi, but lost by around 100,000 votes. Although she lost, Rahul’s victory margin nevertheless shrunk to 1,00,000 votes; a massive trickle down from his victory margins of about 3,70,000 and 2,90,000 votes in 2004 and 2009 general elections respectively.

During his visit, Gandhi would chair the local monitoring committee meeting that keeps track of the various development works in his constituency.

Besides, he would address some public meetings in Amethi to energise Congress cadres ahead of the crucial 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

In fact, he is likely to address about a dozen rallies in UP for canvassing in favour of party candidates.

The SP-BSP pre-poll alliance has kept Congress out of the tie-up, forcing the grand old party to announce that it was also ready to contest on all the 80 Lok Sabha seats in UP.

However, the SP-BSP alliance has left out 2 seats of Amethi and Rae Bareli for Rahul and Sonia Gandhi respectively to contest for a virtual walkover.