Modi rally in Kalaburagi today

Before the official announcement of the elections to Lok Sabha, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will kickstart election campaign for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in the Hyderabad-Karnataka region on Wednesday.

Preparations are in full swing at Nutan Vidyalaya Grounds in the city for Modi’s programme. Modi will address the BJP workers here. BJP general secretary N Ravi Kumar and former deputy chief minister R Ashoka are camping in Kalaburagi for the past two days to supervise the works and make the rally a success. They also held several rounds of meetings with district party leaders.

Modi will leave New Delhi at 8.50 am on Wednesday by a special flight and will arrive at Bidar at 10.50 am. Modi will arrive at Kalaburagi at 11.35 am.

Meanwhile, speculation is rife that Chincholi MLA Dr Umesh Jadhav, who tendered his resignation from the Assembly membership will join the BJP in the presence of Modi. As his resignation is yet to be accepted by Legislative Assembly Speaker
K R Ramesh Kumar, chances of him joining the BJP at the Kalaburagi rally are slim, it is learnt.

Congress Leader in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge has been representing Gulbarga Lok Sabha constituency from 2009. Except 1996 and 1998, the constituency has been a  stronghold of the Congress from 1957 to 2014. The BJP seems to have gone hammer and tongs to wrest this segment from the Congress in the LS polls due in May.

“Mallikarjun Kharge who is taking the NDA government to task in parliament has become a target for Modi. Hence, the BJP is leaving no stone unturned to trounce Kharge this time. As a result, the BJP has lured Chincholi Congress MLA Umesh Jadhav by engineering Operation Lotus to pit him against Kharge. But it will not succeed in its effort to wrest the constituency from the Congress,” a district Congress leader said.

As soon as Jadhav tendered his resignation and is set to join the BJP, former minister Baburao Chavan and others who are ticket aspirants from the BJP have raised the banner of revolt. Former minister Sunil Vallyapure, who was defeated twice at the hands of Jadhav in Chincholi Assembly segment, is learnt to be upset with the party’s decision to induct Jadhav into the BJP.