Bharat Jodo Yatra

Over the next two months, the Manipur-to-Maharashtra yatra will be covering 6,713 km, mostly by bus. From Imphal to Mumbai, Gandhi will criss-cross 15 states, passing through 100 Lok Sabha constituencies, before reaching Mumbai on March 20-21. The custom-made Volvo bus has been equipped with a hydraulic lift so that he can address crowds en route.

Addressing a public meeting in Thoubal, near Imphal, minutes before the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra was flagged off, Gandhi was largely cautious while Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge took on the BJP on its Hindutva pitch. Both criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for not visiting trouble-torn Manipur till date. Gandhi said India was going through a period of great injustice — social, economic and political.

In 2023, Rahul walked from Kanyakumari to Kashmir during the first leg of Bharat Jodo Yatra. The impact of Rahul’s 4,018 km Yatra – which covered 75 districts and 76 Lok Sabha constituencies spread across 12 states and two Union Territories (UTs) over 145 days – on the electoral politics is debatable. And so is the narrative against the politics of hate that he has been trying to set in the last one year.

The Congress said the Yatra had a role in the party’s victory in the Assembly polls in Himachal Pradesh in December last year and in Karnataka in May. It was another matter that the party blamed local factors for its worst defeat in Gujarat which went to polls along with Himachal Pradesh when the Yatra was entering North from South.