At one meeting after another, Priyanka continues to do what she does best: Charm her way into the hearts of voters.
It’s close to noon and the dreaded luh (heat wave) is making its presence felt.
The large crowd at the college ground in Amethi scrambles for cover from the blazing sun. “Bitiya” is over an hour behind schedule. The crowd grows listless. Some even doze off.
But they begin to come alive as the helicopter carrying Priyanka Gandhi appears as a speck on the horizon. Men, women and children make a dash for the makeshift helipad to get a glimpse of her. And once she emerges from the chopper, clad in a green sari and flashing a 1000-watt smile, a semblance of order is restored.
She dismisses the Special Protection Group car that rushes to pick her up, and walks the short distance to the meeting venue, waving and smiling at crowds, and shaking hands with some.
An old freckled woman bends to touch her feet, but Priyanka stops her midway. “Maaji yeh math kijiye (Please don’t do this),” she says and bends down to listen to the woman. She then asks Kishori Lal, the Gandhi family's point man in the Amethi and Rae Barelli constituencies, to ensure that the woman’s work is done and report back to her in “two days”.
Priyanka is campaigning for brother Rahul (Amethi) and mother Sonia (Rae Barelli) leaving the two free to campaign in the rest of the country.
The scene repeats over and over again, as she hits the road in a white Land Cruiser and addresses up to 18 meetings a day, in addition to the countless stops she is forced to make along the way. Her day begins early with a quick meeting with aides and ends well past midnight.
In the eyes of the people of the two constituencies Priyanka can do no wrong. “Yeh Jaadu ki chhadi hai,” says Anwar Khan, a resident of Tillio.
“The people of this area have given so much to us that we will never be able to pay back their love and affection even in seven generations,” she says.
She exhorts the impromptu audiences at every roadside meeting to “think hard before voting”.
“Vote for whoever you think will bring about development. If you think Congress can do that please vote for my brother or vote for whoever you want,” she tells the crowd at Amradih, a sleepy village.
The special affinity between the local populace and the Gandhi family becomes clear when a village pradhan admonishes her for talking to the media instead of the crowd.
At one meeting after another, Priyanka continues to do what she does best: Charm her way into the hearts of voters.
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