LUCKNOW: Union Home Minister and the BJP's senior poll strategist Amit Shah hit the ground running in Kairana by launching a door-to-door campaign in favour of party candidate Mriganka Singh, reiterating the slogan of ‘ab ki baar 300 paar’ (this time beyond 300 seats) on Saturday.
Shah also met a number of families which were forced to leave the town due to threats from local criminals for extortion of money.
Mriganka Singh, daughter of prominent Gurjar leader late Hukum Singh who represented the seat for the BJP for four consecutive terms since 1996 till 2012, is locked in a straight contest with the Samajwadi Part candidate in Kairana. In 2017, Mriganka Singh had lost the seat to the Samajwadi Party’s Nahid Hassan, who has been nominated again by the SP this year but is currently in jail in connection with a case under the Gangster Act.
Consequently, Hassan’s sister Iqra has filed her nomination as an independent to contest as the SP supported candidate if Nahid fails to contest owing to his criminal antecedents.
Speaking to media persons in Kairana, Shah said he interacted with as many as 11 members of the Mittal family who informed him that they no longer live in fear. He added that the family was forced to leave Uttar Pradesh earlier due to the law and order situation.
“I can see the confidence in the people of UP. In the days to come, this is going to be the most developed state of India,” said Amit Shah while heaping praise on UP CM Yogi Adityanath for proper implementation of central welfare schemes on the ground.
Shah claimed that for any state to prosper, the law and order situation needs to be ultimate. “If law and order in UP has to be upheld, appeasement has to be ended, tradition of working for one caste has to be ended and robust development has to be taken forward, then the BJP government has to be formed in UP again with overwhelming majority with more than 300 seats under the leadership of Yogi Adityanath,” said Amit Shah.
Shah further pointed out that during his meeting with the families and door-to-door campaign, people told him it was due to the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh headed by Adityanath that the law and order situation “improved" in the state and those who were forced to migrate have returned.
Shah said that everyone was saying that in the forthcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly polls, “BJP 300 paar (BJP will win over 300 seats).”
He also visited the 70-year-old Sadhu sweet shop, whose owner Rakesh Garg had shifted to Ambala in 2014 following the receipt of a letter from a local gang for extortion of ₹20 lakh. Garg, later, returned to Uttar Pradesh to continue his family business.
On the other hand, while BJP national president JP Nadda held series of meetings with BJP leaders of Nagina, Bijnor and Muzaffarnagar, UP CM Yogi Adityanath took command of the party’s campaign in Aligarh and Bulandshahr on Saturday.