New Delhi: The Congress is set to launch its 3,570 km ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ today (September 7) with a rally to be held in Tamil Nadu’s Kanyakumari at 5 pm today. The actual march, to be led by Rahul Gandhi, is set to begin on Thursday morning.

Gandhi and the other Congress leaders accompanying him will not stay in hotels during the course of the ‘padyatra’, expected to take around 150 days to complete, and will opt to stay in ‘containers’, some of which have been fitted with toilets, beds and air conditioners.

Covering 12 states and two Union Territories, the marching leaders will be joined by all state unit presidents and leaders of the Congress legislature party in their respective states. 

The leaders are expected to walk around 22 km in six or seven hours every day, in two batches – the morning batch, from 7 am to 10:30 am, and the evening batch, from 3:30 pm to 6:30 pm. According to a Hindustan Times report, arrangements have been made for the evening marches to be more elaborate.

Also read: Through Bharat Jodo Yatra, the Congress Must Articulate an Alternative Political Vision

The yatra will start from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu and then move northwards, passing through Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Nilambur, Mysuru, Bellary, Raichur, Vikarabad, Nanded, Jalgaon, Indore, Kota, Dausa, Alwar, Bulandshahr, Delhi, Ambala, Pathankot and Jammu, before culminating in Srinagar.

Notably, the elections for party president – for which the process is already underway – are expected to take place while the yatra is going on. The Congress leaders will be in Karnataka when the elections are held.

Prior to the rally, on Wednesday morning, Gandhi visited the memorial to his father, former president Rajiv Gandhi, in Sriperumbudur and offered flowers and prayers. 

Later in the day, he will attend an event at the Mahatma Gandhi Mandapam where Tamil Nadu chief minister M.K. Stalin will provide him with a khadi national flag, which Gandhi will give to the Seva Dal workers who will manage the yatra.

“There is a lot of enthusiasm and excitement among the Congress workers across the country,” Congress MP Jairam Ramesh told news agency PTI.

Ramesh, as well as other Congress leaders, have dubbed the yatra the “largest” mass mobilisation effort in independent India and the “longest” yatra undertaken by any party.

Further, the party had noted that the yatra was not being held with any particular election in mind but to “unify” India, with Gandhi earlier saying that it is being taken out to combat polarisation and political centralisation in the country, according to NDTV.

(With PTI inputs)

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