Guwahati, Oct. 9: The BJP today said the land-swap deal with Bangladesh would figure prominently during L.K. Advani’s rally in Guwahati on October 20 to be held as part of his 40-day Jan Chetna Yatra.

BJP general secretary Kiran Maheswari said the party would also highlight the scams of the Congress-ruled states in the Northeast during Advani’s anti-corruption yatra, which will traverse through 23 states of the country.

“During his two rallies in Itanagar and Guwahati, Advaniji will not only highlight the scams and corruption by the ruling UPA government at the Centre but will also campaign on how Prime Minister Manmohan Singh decided to hand over portion of Assam land to Bangladesh and chief minister Tarun Gogoi also agreed to the deal compromising the state’s interest,” Maheswari said.

“On the one hand, the Congress government and ministers looted thousands of crores of public money and on the other, it signed an agreement with Bangladesh to hand over our land without any discussion. The BJP has already adopted a political resolution to fight against the land-swap deal and will continue to create public awareness against it,” Maheswari said after a meeting with the party’s leaders here.

The Jan Chetna Yatra will be flagged off from Sitab Diara in Bihar on October 11 and Advani will address two rallies in the Northeast — Guwahati and Itanagar — on October 20 before addressing another in Calcutta the same day.

During the yatra, Advani will travel 7,600km by road and campaign for “good governance and clean politics”. Senior BJP leaders — Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Murli Manohar Joshi and chief ministers of BJP-ruled states are likely to accompany him.

The BJP national vice-president and MP Bijoya Chakraborty said during Advani’s yatra, the party would highlight the scams and irregularities taking place in Assam, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and other states of the region.

“We will prepare a pamphlet on the scams in the Northeast like the NC Hills scam and PDS scam and distribute them among people in all the rallies of Advaniji’s yatra. The pamphlet will also highlight how Assam is witnessing rising crimes and the government’s failure to provide security to the people,” Chakraborty said.

The party also accused the Centre of neglecting the political instability in the Congress-ruled Arunachal Pradesh because of infighting of the party over demand for change of leadership.

“UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and the Centre are turning a blind eye to the problems that the people of Arunachal Pradesh have been facing because of the infighting in the Congress. More than half of the MLAs and Congress leaders from the state have been camping in New Delhi for the past four months and as a result functioning of the government has come to a standstill,” BJP general secretary Tapir Gao said.