Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi to kick off UP poll drive next month

LUCKNOW: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi could together kick-start the party's campaign for the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly elections at a workers' meeting in Lucknow next month.

"The top leadership will meet in Delhi to shape campaign plans. Priyanka's role will also be known then," a senior functionary said.

Congress workers have been pushing for a formal role for Priyanka in the Uttar Pradesh elections.But the 46-year-old has so far campaigned only in family boroughs of Rae Bareli and Amethi - her mother Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi's Lok Sabha constituencies - respectively.

Rahul had to address a workers' meeting in Lucknow in June, but it was put off to shake up the party's Uttar Pradesh unit, senior Congress functionaries said. As the party looks to define a clear role for Priyanka, UP Congress might also get a Brahmin chief.

After the Lucknow launch, likely around August 12, Congress will begin its campaign in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's parliamentary constituency Varanasi. Congress won only 28 of the 355 seats it contested in the 2012 UP assembly elections.

Congress general secretary and party in charge of UP affairs, Ghulam Nabi Azad, recently rejected media reports on the possibility of Priyanka leading the poll campaign in the state.

The UP assembly is due for reconstitution in February-March next year, but the government can dissolve it even before that and pave way for early elections.