Lucknow: Following Prime Minister Narendra Modi‘s visit to Lucknow for Dussehra on Tuesday, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav marks it more than festive delight.
“If there were elections in Bihar, perhaps he would have gone there,” he said today in Lucknow. Uttar Pradesh will host Assembly polls early next year.
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“I feel festivities should be kept aside from politics. But if the PM is visiting UP, he must have thought this through. Could be that he might gift something to the state of UP,” he said.
At a huge rally on Sunday in Lucknow, opposition leader, and BSP Supremo Mayawati, also said PM Modi’s visit is “politically motivated“.
In a deviation from culture, PM Modi will not join Dussehra celebrations at Delhi’s popular Ramlila Maidan, but in Lucknow, he will set fire to a massive Ravan effigy.
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The BJP had mopped Uttar Pradesh in general elections in 2014, PM Modi came to power with a powerful mandate by acquiring 71 of the 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state.
The UP assembly polls are expected to be a pitched, a four-way battle between the BJP, the Congress, the ruling Samajwadi Party and the opposition BSP.