Amit Shah to launch BJP's 'Parivartan Yatra' from Dantewada on Sept 12

Chhattisgarh Assembly elections: The parivartan yatra will cover a distance of 1,728 km over 16 days

Union Home Minister Amit Shah is set to launch the "parivartan yatra" from Dantewada under Bastar in Chhattisgarh on September 12. 

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesman Sanjay Srivastav said that Shah will pay obeisance to Maa Danteshwari in the district headquarters of Dantewada on the day before flagging off the yatra.

The Parivartan Yatra will cover a distance of 1,728 km over 16 days.

Srivastav said that the second "parivartan yatra" will be launched in Jashpur in north Chhattisgarh by BJP national president J P Nadda on September 16.

Mr Nadda is scheduled to perform ‘puja’ in Maa Khudia Rani temple in the district headquarters of Jashpur before flagging off the yatra. The second yatra is expected to cover a distance of 1,261 km over 12 days.

The two yatras would cover 87 of 90 Assembly constituencies in Chhattisgarh before converging at Bilaspur on September 28.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to address a rally of BJP workers on the occasion.

Srivastav said that three Naxal-infested Assembly constituencies of Bijapur, Sukma, and Antagarh under the Bastar division have been left out of the yatra over security reasons.

Security to all parties, says CM Baghel

Last week, the BJP sent a letter to the state's Director General of Police, requesting safety for its "parivartan yatra"  in Naxal-affected Dantewada.

The party stated that it did not trust the state's Congress government as its leaders were targeted and assassinated in the Bastar area.

On May 25, 2013, ahead of the assembly elections, Maoists attacked a convoy of Congress leaders during the party's "Parivartan rally" in the Jhiram valley in Bastar district, killing 29 people, including then-state Congress chief Nand Kumar Patel, former leader of the opposition Mahendra Karma, and former Union minister V C Shukla.

Last week, in a significant development and a first in Naxal-hit Chhattisgarh, the Election Commission announced the opening of polling stations in 40 villages of the Bastar division.