Today in Politics: Campaign to end for phase 1 LS polls, PM Modi in northeast, Rahul to hold 2 rallies in Karnataka

The top brass of the BJP and Congress will campaign aggressively on Wednesday, the last day of campaigning for the first phase of the Lok Sabha polls to be held on April 19.

Prime Minister Modi will first address a public meeting in Nalbari of Assam after which he will participate in a rally in Agartala.

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari will virtually address people in Nagpur, where he is up against Congress’s INDIA bloc candidate Vikas Thakre.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will address three rallies in Kerala at Kannur, Kasargod and Vadakara. All 20 Lok Sabha seats of the state go to polls in the first phase.

Meanwhile, the Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will continue their campaign trail. While the former Congress president will be in Karnataka, his sister will campaign in Saharanpur, the lone seat from UP from where the Congress is in the fray in the first phase.

Rahul will address two rallies in Mandya and Kolar of Karnataka. The JD(S), which has allied with the BJP for the Lok Sabha polls, has fielded former CM H D Kumaraswamy from the Mandya seat, seen to be the party’s stronghold. He will be up against the Congress’s Venkataramegowda alias “Star Chandru”. Incidentally, Kolar was where Rahul made his infamous “Modi surname” speech in 2019 which led to his conviction and subsequent disqualification from the Lok Sabha.

A total of 102 seats across 14 states and union territories will go to polls in the first phase on Friday.

The Trinamool Congress will hold a Shobha Yatra in West Bengal’s Howrah to mark Ram Navami. The rally will be led by the party’s Lok Sabha candidate for Howrah Prasun Banerjee and will have Jadavpur candidate Sayoni Ghosh, and ministers Arup Roy and Manoj Tiwary in attendance.

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