Priyanka Gandhi on 3-day visit to review Congress' UP poll readiness.
Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra arrived in Lucknow on Thursday to review the party’s preparedness for the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. During her three-day stay, Priyanka Gandhi will take stock of the Congress readiness for the crucial elections from the leaders and workers of the party’s state unit.
On her arrival, she told reporters at the airport that she has come to meet the party workers. Congress legislature party leader Aradhana Mishra and senior party leader Pramod Tiwari among others received her at the airport.
Several party programmes are lined up for her on Friday and Saturday. State Congress media and communication coordinator Lallan Kumar said the AICC in charge of Uttar Pradesh will hold meetings with the party’s election committee and advisory committee of the state unit.
He further said she will review the district-wise progress of the party's mass contact programme "Har Goan Congress" (Congress in every village).
The Uttar Pradesh Congress had launched a mass contact programme on August 19 to cover the state's 30,000 villages and wards where party leaders were directed to stay for over three days during the drive.
She will also take feedback from the party’s newly appointed Nyaya Panchayat chiefs and office-bearers from across the state.
The Congress general secretary will also finalise the blueprint of party programmes for the next one month. Kumar said she will also review the progress of the first phase of the party’s "Prashikshan Se Parakram (valour through training)” programme.
Launched last month, the programme aims at giving training to two lakh party grassroots workers by holding 700 training camps. Priyanka Gandhi who is leading the party campaign in politically significant Uttar Pradesh has a Herculean task to lift the grand old party's sliding stock in the state.
The Congress was totally decimated in the 2017 state polls winning only seven assembly seats in the 403-member UP assembly polls.
In 2019 Lok Sabha elections, it could manage to hold Rae Bareli Parliamentary seat of AICC chief Sonia Gandhi but lost the Gandhi family's bastion Amethi where Rahul Gandhi was humbled by Union Minister Smriti Irani.
The Congress has already made it clear that it will not have any alliance with the Samajwadi Party or Bahujan Samaj Party this time and would prefer tie-ups with some smaller UP-centric parties.
