Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday devoted the initial part of his 25-minute speech at the inauguration of the Ganga Expressway in Uttar Pradesh’s Hardoi to praising the people of Bengal, in a last-ditch effort to sway the voters of the eastern state.
“Many hours are still left to vote there. I appeal to the people of Bengal to participate in the festival of democracy with similar enthusiasm (which they had shown in the first phase),” Modi said at 12.30pm, when voting was underway around 900km away.
He pointed out that the BJP-led NDA won last year’s Assembly elections in
neighbouring Bihar and his party had just emerged victorious in the local body
elections in Gujarat, claiming that the BJP would win the elections in Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam and Puducherry.
“I was in the proximity of Ma Ganga for the last four-five days. I did a darshan of Ma Ganga. And yesterday, I was in Kashi (Varanasi). Today is also an important day of the festival of democracy. Bengal is voting at the moment, and from the news we are receiving, massive voting is underway in the state. The people are coming out of their houses in large numbers to cast their votes the way they did in the first phase,” he said.
Modi took a boat ride in the Hooghly on April 24.
“There are pictures of long queues all over social media. For the first time in the last six-seven decades, Bengal is not voting in the shadow of fear. It was difficult to imagine this in the past. This is a sign of the country’s strong democracy. I express my gratitude to the people of Bengal for being aware of their rights,” he added.
The 598km Ganga Expressway between Allahabad and Meerut connects 12 districts of Uttar Pradesh. Modi said it would soon be extended to Haridwar in Uttarakhand.
Government sources said Modi’s speech was extensively livestreamed on social media, and BJP leaders in Bengal were asked to ensure that it reached the maximum number of people.