New Delhi: Congress’ ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ starting from September 7 will be under the national flag and three chief ministers — Tamil Nadu’s M.K. Stalin, Chhattisgarh’s Bhupesh Baghel and Rajasthan’s Ashok Gehlot — will hand over the national flag to Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday.
The purpose behind the march with the national flag is that the Congress wants other like-minded parties and civil society groups to join the programme, said a Congress leader.
On the proposed march, Rahul Gandhi on Sunday said that the opposition has no way but to go to the people of the country.
Prior to the Congress’ ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’, Rahul Gandhi will visit the Rajiv Gandhi memorial at Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu on September 7.
The Gandhi scion will be visiting the place for the first time where his father and the country’s former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in 1991.
Gandhi will visit Vivekananda Rock Memorial, Thiruvalluvar Memorial and Kamaraj memorial. All-religion prayer will be conducted at Gandhi Mandapam at Kanyakumari where Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin will hand over the Tricolour to the Wayanad MP. All the leaders will then walk to the meeting venue at the nearby Gandhi Mandapam.
The meeting will be held at 5 p.m. from where an official announcement of the launch of the yatra will be made.
On September 8, the padyatra (foot march) will start from Vivekananda Institute at 7 a.m. and will continue for three hours. It will resume at 3.30 p.m. the same day and continue till 6.30 p.m. Everyday, the yatra will cover 21 km.
The yatra will reach Kerala on September 11 and will continue there for 18 days before reaching Karnataka on September 30. The yatra will continue in Karnataka for 21 days..
The Congress claimed that the padyatra was aimed at eliminating hatred.
The yatra passing through 12 states will cover 3,500 km from Kanyakumari to Jammu and Kashmir in five months (150 days) and 118 leaders will participate in it. The tentative list of leaders who will participate in the yatra include Congress Youth leader Kanhaiya Kumar, Pawan Khera and former Punjab Minister Vijay Inder Singla.
–IANS