Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra to begin from Manipur today

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will start his nearly 6,200-km, two-month long Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra from Thoubal in Manipur on Sunday in the presence of the top party leaders and chief ministers . Party president Mallikarjun Kharge will flag off the yatra at a public meeting During his yatra, to be mostly by bus, Gandhi will spend about 10 days in the northeastern states including Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Assam.

This is the sequel to Gandhi's Kanyakumari-Srinagar Bharat Jodo yatra on foot last year and it will culminate in Mumbai in March end. Even though the Congress maintains that "it is not an electoral yatra", it is being widely seen as the Congress' pre-poll mass mobilisation with focus on yet another rebranding of Gandhi's leadership role. The yatra -2 is starting at a time when the BJP and PM Modi have launched a blitzkrieg over the upcoming inauguration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.

The Congress choosing Manipur to start Gandhi's Yatra-2 is being seen as its way of sending a larger message of seeking justice for the strife-torn state. Gandhi along with AICC, CWC and PCC leaders are reaching here on Sunday from Delhi on a chartered flight to kick off the yatra.


"It is a yatra by a political party. We take out yatra for political purposes and our purpose is to protect the Constitution and Democracy... It is an ideological yatra and not an electoral one,, said Jairam Ramesh, AICC communications in-charge here. Some important Congress leaders of the NE, including former Manipur CM Ibobi Singh, PCC president Meghchandra Singh, Ex-CM of Arunachal Pradesh Nabam Tuki and CWC member Kaikhangam, too spoke at the yatra-eve media address. Ramesh said during the yatra, Gandhi will not only demand social, political and economic justice for the people, especially the poor and socially backward, from the Modi government but will also unveil his alternative agenda for delivering justice.