Priyanka Gandhi’s ‘Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra’ in Bihar to keep alliance’s momentum going

The road to power is a long winding one, and the Opposition’s Grand Alliance in Bihar wants to make the journey count. After Rahul Gandhi’s Voter Adhikar Yatra and Tejashwi Yadav’s Bihar Adhikar Yatra, it may soon be Priyanka Gandhi traversing through the poll-bound state on a Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra.

Convinced that both Rahul and Tejashwi’s yatras have galvanised the Opposition’s support base, despite reports of rifts between their two parties, the Congress and the RJD, the Congress is determined to not let the momentum dissipate.

Also Read: Tejashwi Yadav's solo yatra strains Mahagathbandhan unity

CWC meeting in Patna

The party had already announced that it would hold a meeting of its extended Congress Working Committee (CWC) in Patna on September 24, which will be attended by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Lok Sabha’s Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi, Wayanad MP Priyanka Gandhi, and a host of other senior party leaders from across the country. It is, however, unclear at the moment whether Congress Parliamentary Party chief Sonia Gandhi would also attend the Patna conclave.

Party sources said the decision to host the extended CWC in Patna is meant to convey to Bihar’s electorate that the party, which has been surviving on the margins of Bihar’s politics for nearly four decades, is taking its revival in the state and the upcoming assembly polls with the utmost seriousness. Sources said the CWC is expected to adopt a strongly-worded resolution against the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of Bihar’s electoral rolls while also pledging to rebuild and revive the party in the state. On September 25, a battery of CWC members and senior leaders of the Bihar Congress are expected to conduct a door-to-door campaign in Patna.

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Priyanka’s yatra

Sources said that Priyanka could launch her Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra with a rally in Khagaria, on September 26. A party leader privy to the plans for the yatra, however, said there was a possibility that the Wayanad MP may launch the yatra from a different city too as Khagaria had been ravaged by excessive rains over the past few days.

“We had finalised the Sansarpur Sports Ground (in Khagaria) as the rally venue for September 26 and the yatra was scheduled to start the next day, but late Thursday (September 18) we received inputs from the district unit that the ground was completely waterlogged due to heavy rains. We will wait for a day or two to see if the situation improves. In the meantime, the PCC is coordinating with Priyanka’s team to look at an alternate site for her rally as a back-up,” the leader told The Federal.

Among the alternate sites being considered for Priyanka’s rally and the yatra’s launch is Motihari in East Champaran, said another Congress leader. However, since Motihari and Khagaria are in two different regions of Bihar, sources said that switching the launch venue to Motihari would also require a change in the yatra route that was being considered until Friday (September 19).

Also Read: After success of Voter Adhikar Yatra, Grand Alliance plans another yatra in Bihar

10-day yatra

Party leaders however insist that while the yatra route may be tentative, the plans for a Priyanka-led outreach will not change. As of now, sources said the Congress is hoping for a yatra that will last up to 10 days and traverse through constituencies that had been left uncharted by Rahul’s 17-day-long Voter Adhikar Yatra, which had crossed over 100 of the state’s 243 assembly segments spread across 25 of Bihar’s 38 districts.

The final programme of the Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra may, however, be tweaked further after the Election Commission’s announcement of the Bihar’s poll schedule, which the Opposition expects to be made by this month-end.

What also remains to be seen is whether Priyanka, like Rahul, ensures that the Congress’s alliance partners – RJD, CPI-MLL, VIP, CPI and CPM – get to share the spotlight with her during the Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra, or mirrors the approach taken by Tejashwi, whose recently-concluded Bihar Adhikar Yatra saw no prominent face from the allied parties joining the outreach effort.

Also Read: Voter Adhikar Yatra, a people’s push against political manipulation

‘No competition between yatras’

The marked difference between Rahul and Tejashwi’s yatras, in terms of the participation of senior leaders of allied parties, has already triggered heady rumours of a rift between the Congress and the RJD, which both parties are now busy brushing aside.

“These yatras are meant to complement and supplement each other and are not a means to assert the supremacy of any ally. Tejashwi’s yatra had already been decided even before Rahul’s yatra concluded because Tejashwi wanted to visit those areas which could not be covered (in the Voter Adhikar Yatra) because several of them are RJD strongholds,” said a senior Congress leader, adding that reports of “Tejashwi going on his Bihar Adhikar Yatra because Rahul stole the spotlight during the Voter Adhikar Yatra” are absolutely false.

Congress sources said the fact that the issues raised by Rahul and Tejashwi in their respective yatras were “different but complementary” belies the “BJP’s propaganda” about the two leaders trying to outsmart each other within the Grand Alliance’s campaign.

“Rahul stuck to the issue of the SIR and vote chori throughout his yatra and then Tejashwi followed that up by expanding on the anti-SIR campaign and also raising issues that are of specific importance to Bihar like migration, corruption of the Nitish Kumar government, joblessness, deteriorating law and order situation, etc.,” said a senior RJD MLC.

Also Read: As Rahul Gandhi's Voter Adhikar Yatra ends, can it challenge Modi-Nitish? | Capital Beat

‘Priyanka will target women voters’

Priyanka’s yatra, sources said, is expected to add another flank to the Grand Alliance outreach, as it will largely target women voters of the state through ‘mahila samvad’ (women’s dialogue) programmes that will be interspersed through the Har Ghar Adhikar Yatra. The Wayanad MP, who has a reputation of being a better communicator than her elder sibling, will also spend part of the yatra each day interacting with groups of people during door-to-door campaigns and speaking about the poll “guarantees” that her party has been speaking about in the state.

“She is going to raise issues of Anganwadi sewikas and Jeevika Didi sewikas (women enrolled in the Bihar government’s rural livelihood project),” a party leader told The Federal. The promise of financial assistance for women under the Mai Bahin Maan Yojana, a key poll guarantee of both Congress and RJD, is also expected to figure prominently in Priyanka’s outreach.

Several prominent Congress leaders, including Ashok Gehlot, Sachin Pilot, Bhupinder Hooda, chief ministers Revanth Reddy and Siddaramaiah, are expected to join Priyanka’s yatra on different dates, said sources.