Mukherjee cuts his Bihar trip short to avoid clash with Modi rally

President Pranab Mukherjee on Thursday revised the dates of his visit to Patna, as it clashes with a rally to be addressed the Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.

BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain and vice-president Rajiv Pratap Rudy met Mukherjee on Thursday and convinced him about the need to revise the dates of his visit to Bihar.

According to report, the President will visit Patna on October 26 and will return to New Delhi the same day. Modi is scheduled to attend the rally in Patna on October 27.

"It was a courtesy call since he is coming to Bihar and our rally is on the 27th. The President has now cancelled his night halt and will return to the national capital the same day," Hussain told media outside Rashtrapati Bhavan .

"We made a courtesy call. We are profoundly grateful to the President of India. He was extremely considerate. He had plans to visit Bihar on (October) 26 and 27. As you are all aware, we have a massive rally in Patna called a Hunkar Rally which is being organised on 27 of this month which will be attended by Narendra Modi," Rudy said.

"We were concerned about the inconvenience that could have been caused in his visit due to our rally," he added.

Earlier, the BJP had accused Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of creating hurdles by scheduling the President's program on the day Modi is scheduled to address the crowd.