Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh): Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday filed his nomination papers from the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat, accompanied by a galaxy of top BJP and NDA leaders.
Modi offered prayers at a temple before he went to the Collectorate.
PM Modi files his nomination
In a show of strength, Modi's nomination was attended by BJP and it's allies:
- BJP President Amit Shah
- Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath
- Bihar CM and JD(U) chief Nitish Kumar
- Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray
- LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan
- Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road Transport and Highways
- Home Miniter Rajnath Singh
- Sushma Swaraj, Minister of External Affairs of India
-
O. Panneerselvam, Deputy chief minister of Tamil Nadu
-
Parkash Badal, Akali Dal chief
Modi's first nomination as a Prime Minister in 2014 was attended by:
- BJP President Amit Shah
- Minister of Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi
- Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad
Modi's 2014 election battle:
- Modi won the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat in 2014 by defeating his nearest rival, Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal, by a massive margin of over 3,00,000 votes.
- All the other major players in the contest - Ajay Rai of Congress, Vijay Kumar Jaiswal of BSP and Kailash Chaurasia of Samajwadi Party - were made to bite the dust with none of them securing more than one-sixth of the total number of votes and they now run the risk of forfeiting their deposits.
- The BJP leader had to wait for around 20 minutes as an Independent was submitting his papers. A tea local vendor and a BJP member for 25 years, Kiran Mahida, had then proposed Modi's nomination.
- In 2014, Modi had made a pitch for good governance on the lines of the erstwhile ruler of Baroda state Maharaja Saiyajirao Gaekwad. It remains to be seen what will be the Prime Minister's pitch for 2019.
Read: Modi concludes roadshow with Ganga aarti, will file nomination tomorrow
