PM Modi to address rally in UP's Maghar, to launch BJP's poll bugle for 2019

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Thursday address a rally in Uttar Pradesh's Gorakhpur district, and is all set to sound BJP’s poll bugle from Maghar town known as ‘gateway to hell’.

During his visit today, Modi will also lay the foundation stone for an institute named after Kabir Das to mark the 500th death anniversary of the mystic poet.

Modi will now fly directly to Maghar in Sant Kabir Nagar district from Lucknow, instead of landing first at Gorakhpur airport that was closed today after rainwater flooded the runway.

During his monthly radio address "Mann Ki Baat" on Sunday, the prime minister had recalled the contribution of the 15th-century poet-saint in dispelling superstition.

"The entire rally venue is divided into 37 blocks, two wings and four zones. One lakh people would be able to sit in the main pandal," BJP zonal president Dharmendra Singh said.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party had made Varanasi the epicentre of party's campaign.

"Just as the prime minister gave a message from the Gorakhnath peeth in Gorakhpur in 2014, he will give a message from the nirvanasthali of Kabir Das this time," BJP's zonal vice president Satyendra Sinha said.

In recently held by-polls, the Samajwadi Party (SP) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which contested separately during UP assembly polls and lost to BJP, emerged winners after joining hands in Gorakhpur and Phulpur.

Earlier this month, Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav had said that they will take other opposition parties along against the BJP in 2019 Lok Sabha elections without "annoying anyone".

"We are ready to make an alliance with other parties to take on the BJP in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections," Akhilesh had said.

(With PTI inputs)