Varanasi, Aug 1 (UNI) Union home and cooperation minister Amit Shah offered prayers at one of the Dwadasa Jyotirlingas Kashi Vishwanath Mandir here on Sunday evening.
He came here along with Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath after laying the foundation stone for Vindhya Corridor and inaugurating ropeway in adjoining Mirzapur district.
This religious centric visit of Shah is considered as an important one on the eve of forthcoming 2022 assembly elections in the state.
After offering prayers at Kashi Vishwanath temple amidst the chanting of mantras, Mr Shah also inspected the under-construction Kashi Vishwanath Corridor, the ‘dream project’ of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his parliamentary constituency. During his inspection, Mr Shah asked about various details about the project and gave some instructions to the officers concerned.
Mr Shah's visit is important because though he belongs to Gujarat, he had played a big role in chalking out effective strategies of the BJP in all the three big elections in the state including 2014 and 2019 parliamentary and 2017 assembly polls in which the party had performed well. Since 2014, Mr Shah is closely looking after all the political activities in the state, he knows the nerves of the voters and this visit is an indication that the BJP still believes fully in its pro-Hindu agenda.
After Vidhyachal in Mirzapur, Shah landed at the helipad of Sampurnanand Sanskrit University (SSU) ground from where he reached Kashi Vishwanath temple in car, along with the CM and other senior BJP leaders including state president Swatantra Dev Singh, regional chief Mahesh Chandra Srivastava and many others including UP ministers and party’s MLAs. During his stay here, he also talked to the BJP leaders about the preparations for the forthcoming assembly elections.
In view of the visit of the union home minister and chief minister, elaborate security arrangements were made and several traffic restrictions were imposed in the areas from Shah’s motorcade proposed to pass through. Senior administrative and police officers were present during his short visit here.
Later, Shah reached Lal Bahadur Shastri International Airport at Babatpur from where he left for Delhi. During his hectic day-long visit to UP, Shah visited two important religious places in this belt of Purvanchal (eastern UP) apart from the state capital.
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