BJP to launch MP poll campaign at party convention next month

The BJP would launch its campaign for the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls at a convention to be held here on September 25, a senior leader said today.

The gathering--Mahakumbh--is being organised to mark the birth anniversary of RSS ideologue and Bhartiya Jana Sangh co-founder Deendayal Upadhyay, at the BHEL Jamboree Maidan.

State unit BJP president Rakesh Singh said they would invite Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the event to be attended by party chief Amit Shah, leaders of the BJP from Madhya Pradesh and party workers.

"The Madhya Pradesh BJP would launch its poll campaign by holding 'Mahakumbh' on the birth anniversary of Deendayal Upadhyay on September 25. Party president Amit Shah will attend the convention," Singh told reporters.

Singh also said that Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan's ongoing "Jan Ashirwad Yatra", which was earlier scheduled to be culminated at the convention, would continue even after September 25.

Assembly polls are slated to be held in the central state later this year, schedule for which is yet to be announced by the Election Commission.

Singh said the BJP had organised similar gatherings ahead of the assembly polls in 2008 and 2013.

Responding to a query on the photos purportedly showing some leaders of the state BJP laughing while carrying the urns containing ashes of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Singh said these photos are doctored.

The photos had gone viral on the social media.

Madhya Pradesh has a 230-member assembly.

The Congress has been out of power in the BJP-ruled state since 2003.