PM Narendra Modi to visit Himachal, Gujarat

Tribune News Service

Vibha Sharma

New Delhi, May 22

Stepping up the BJP pitch in two states scheduled to go to the polls later this year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be in home state Gujarat on May 28 followed by Himachal Pradesh on May 31.

At present, both states are ruled by the BJP. Leaders indicate PM Modi will once again be the main face for the party in the upcoming elections after a successful run in four out of five states earlier this year.

The party is depending upon the tried and tested model of “double-engine governance” with schemes for “labharthis” (as the party likes to call beneficiaries of the central schemes) forming the backdrop. The reduction in fuel prices appears aimed at assuaging some anger, especially in the middle class, over inflation and rising prices.

While in Gujarat, the BJP changed the Chief Minister last year, in Himachal Pradesh, though there was a buzz about a similar possibility, suspense continues.

Sources say the leadership is confident of the “unbreakable trust of people in the Prime Minister” and the army of “labharthis” the party has built on “pro-poor, pro-people” central schemes.

With “Hindutva” and nationalism being the two constants, what worked for the BJP, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, was the genesis of this new group called “labharthis”. Cutting across caste groups, the section of people who got benefits, including monetary and free foodgrain, during the Covid-19 pandemic, proved to be the real winners for the saffron party in the Assembly elections earlier this year.

The schedule

• PM Modi will be in his home state Gujarat on May 28
• He will visit Himachal Pradesh on May 31

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