NE NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, AUG 8
Senior Congress leader and Wayanad MP Rahul Gandhi will undertake the second leg of his Bharat Jodo Yatra from Gujarat to Meghalaya, a senior party leader said on Tuesday. In the first leg of the yatra, Gandhi had walked around 4,000 km from Kanyakumari to Kashmir.
LIVE: पत्रकार परिषद https://t.co/0IxoK8lb8Y
— Nana Patole (@NANA_PATOLE) August 8, 2023
“The second leg of Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra will begin from Gujarat to Meghalaya,” Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole said, adding that party leaders in the state will hold a parallel march. He said the schedule of the march will be announced later.
पदयात्रा व बसयात्रेच्या माध्यमातून काँग्रेस महाराष्ट्र पिंजून काढणार
यात्रेच्या माध्यमातून भ्रष्ट भाजपा सरकारची पोलखोल करणार.
लोकसभेच्या ४८ मतदारसंघाचा विधानसभानिहाय आढावा घेणार.
– प्रदेशाध्यक्ष नाना पटोले
राहुल गांधी यांच्या नेतृत्वाखालील भारत जोडो यात्रेचा दुसरा टप्पा… pic.twitter.com/puP8DvYCsj
— Maharashtra Congress (@INCMaharashtra) August 8, 2023
- In the first leg, Gandhi walked 4,000 km from Kanyakumari to Kashmir
- The Gujarat Congress has already invited Gandhi to start the second phase of the yatrafrom the state
- Rahul Gandhi has been re-allotted the 12, Tughlaq Lane bungalow a day after his disqualification as Lok Sabha member was restored
Patole said Gandhi, whose Lok Sabha membership has been restored after the Supreme Court stayed his conviction in a defamation case, will be accorded a grand welcome by the party when he arrives in Mumbai for a meeting of the opposition alliance INDIA in August-end.
“We will start a padayatra (in Maharashtra) when Rahul Gandhi starts his own padayatra from Gujarat to Meghalaya. The programme (to carry out the march in the state) has been given to us by the All India Congress Committee (AICC),” Patole told reporters in Mumbai.
The Gujarat Congress has already invited Gandhi to start the second phase of the yatra from the western state.
“We have extended an invitation to Rahul Gandhi to start the second phase of Bharat Jodo Yatra from Gujarat, which is the land of Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Patel. The second phase should begin from the state,” Amit Chavda, Leader of Opposition in the Gujarat Assembly, said on Monday.
In the first leg, which began from Kanyakumari on September 7, 2022 and concluded in Srinagar on January 30 this year, Gandhi covered 12 states and two Union territories.
Meanwhile, the restoration of Rahul Gandhi’s parliament membership has given a new vigor to the INDIA alliance formed to take on the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Gandhi was disqualified as Lok Sabha member from Wayanad in Kerala on March 24 after a Surat court sentenced him a day earlier to two years in jail in a 2019 defamation case connected to the “Modi surname” remark.
The Supreme Court, on August 4, stayed the conviction, paving the way for Gandhi’s reinstatement as LS MP.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has been re-allotted the 12, Tughlaq Lane bungalow a day after his disqualification as Lok Sabha member was restored following a directive of the Supreme Court, officials said on Tuesday.
The House Committee of the Lok Sabha has decided to allot the same bungalow he was asked to vacate after Gandhi was disqualified as member of the lower house on March 24 as a result of his conviction and a two-year jail term awarded to him for the ‘Modi surname’ remarks.
“Mera ghar pura Hindustan hai (Whole country is my home),” quipped Gandhi when asked about being allotted the 12, Tughlaq Lane bungalow.
On Monday, the Lok Sabha Secretariat restored Gandhi’s membership of the lower house after the Supreme Court stayed his conviction in the defamation case.
In April, Rahul Gandhi vacated his official residence in central Delhi, in line with protocol, after he was disqualified as an MP in March following a Surat court’s conviction in the criminal defamation case.
A disqualified MP is not entitled to a government accommodation and gets a month’s time to vacate the official residence.
