Concerned with the fear of cross-voting and invalid voting, Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday met party MPs in batches from various states and asked them to attend the election and vote in favour of UPA candidate Pranab Mukherjee.
Taking the initiative herself, Sonia Gandhi explained the voting process after distributing the model ballot paper. She is understood to have asked the party MPs to mark single preference in favour of Pranab Mukherjee. In a brief but business-like interaction with the MPs, Sonia Gandhi underlined the importance of each single vote in getting the UPA candidate elected with a huge margin. She also asked the MPs to maintain caution during the voting so that nothing goes wrong and all formalities are completed.
Sonia also extended personal invitation to party MPs for a lunch on Wednesday being hosted by her for MPs belonging to the constituent parties of UPA.
Party sources said that outside supporters of UPA are also to likely to join the lunch.