The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Shiv Sena will jointly organise a rally titled ‘Savarkar Gaurav Yatra’ at Sambhajinagar on Sunday. The yatra, which will be held across Maharashtra, ends on April 6.
The rally will start from the City Square named after the Hindu ideologue and culminate at Ahilyabai Holkar Marg in city. Incidentally, the ruling party’s rally is just one km away from the venue chosen by the Maha Vikas Aghadi for its rally also on Sunday evening.
The rallies in Sambhajinagar are taking place amidst tension following communal clashes on Ram Navmi. Additional police force has been deployed to avoid any untoward incidents.
The BJP yatra has been organised to protest against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s controversial remark on Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.
At the Sambhajinagar rally, locally elected MLAs representing the BJP and the Shiv Sena will be in attendance. The minister of state for finance Bhagwat Karad and state cooperation minister Atul Save will also participate in the rally.
The rallies will take place across districts crossing Marathwada, North Maharashtra, Western Maharashtra, Konkan and Vidarbha. Every local unit will organise rallies in their respective Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies. The aim is to cover 48 Lok Sabha and 288 Assembly constituencies.
In Mumbai, the rallies will take place in all six Lok Sabha constituencies encompassing 36 Assembly segments. The Mumbai BJP chief Ashish Shelar will lead the campaign. Whereas, state BJP president Chandrashekhar Bawankule will lead state wide campaign in honour of Savarkar.
Chief minister Eknath Shinde and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis will also participate in the rallies. Fadnavis will address a rally on Monday at Kandivali West.