Rahul embarks on second leg of election campaign

Sasaram: AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi is arriving in Sasaram on Friday on the second leg of his whirlwind election campaign in Bihar in favour of Congress candidates.

Gandhi, who visited the state only a couple of days ago on a day-long trip and addressed two public rallies at Buxar and Aurangabad, is scheduled to arrive at Sasaram from Bagdogra airport at around 1600 hours to address another mammoth rally there.

The second visit of the Congress youth icon in Bihar in as many days holds special significance for the state party leadership as well as for the supporters in the wake of unexpected cold shoudering of its two major allies- the RJD and LJP - in terms of seat-sharing formula in the state before the coming Lok Sabha election.

After RJD supremo Lalu Prasad and LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan announced their unilateral decision to put up candidates in 37 of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar leaving only the remaining three seats to the Congress, the party high command straight away refused to accept it and in a tit-for-tat gesture nominated Congress candidatures for 37 seats.

The sudden development had rejuvenated the Congress workers in the state to a great extent, who, till a few days ago, looked demoralised not only because of their dwindling support base but also because of the alleged big-brotherly attitude of the RJD and LJP leadership in state politics.

The well-calculated visit of Mr Gandhi in this critical juncture has turned out to be a shot in the arm for the Bihar Pradesh Congress leadership which lost no time in organising a number of election rallies in different parts of the state with a view to improving the winning prospects of party candidates across the state.

Earlier, addressing well attended rallies in Buxar and Aurangabad on April 1, Mr Gandhi, in a hard-hitting speech, claimed that the UPA government had fulfilled all its promises and averred that the hue and cry of the Opposition was only aimed at ''extracting political mileage in the coming elections.''

In both the rallies, he lambasted the BJP and other Opposition parties for their ''baseless'' criticism of the UPA and said such remarks would augur well neither for the country nor for the people at large.

Urging the Opposition leaders to desist from making any such ''unfounded and misleading'' comment, Mr Gandhi gave a detailed account of a series of developmental schemes undertaken by the UPA government during the past five years for bettering the socio-economic condition of the underpriviledged.

Now it remains to be seen how the AICC general secretary would try to motivate the electorate in Sasaram and other Lok Sabha constituencies in Bihar to cast their ballots in favour of party candidates.