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PM inaugurates water project, woos North Guj voters

PM attempts to wrest more seats from Congress ahead of state Assembly elections later this year

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Local leaders welcome PM Narenda Modi at Modasa in Aravalli district on Friday
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Prime minister Narendra Modi paid a visit to North Gujarat on Friday providing a much-needed morale boost for BJP workers. 

The PM inaugurated the Rs570crore Vatrak-Majhum-Meshvo water supply project in Modasa town of Aravalli district. 

In the last assembly election in 2012, BJP could not manage to get a single seat out of the three seats of Bhiloda, Modasa and Bayad. 

Even in neighbouring Sabarkantha, BJP secured only the Idar constituency seat, while Himatnagar, Khedbrahma and Prantij seats went to Congress. 

Later, just before Lok Sabha polls in 2014, Congress MLA from Himatnagar, Rajendrsinh Parmar defected to the BJP, helping the party up its tally to two. However, the district is currently feeling the heat of the Patel agitation and BJP fears a major hit in the upcoming assembly polls.

Given this backdrop, the PM went all out woo voters and wrest more seats from the Congress. 

People from both districts were brought to Modasa, located 130km from Ahmedabad, for the PM’s public meeting. 

Modi tried to touch a chord by recalling the days he spent in this region, and how   he travelled on bicycle or two-wheeler with social workers. 

Taking a dig at the Congress, the PM said, “When the blueprint of the Narmada project was charted out, the entire North Gujarat region was ignored by former governments led by the Congress at the state and in the centre. When our government came to power, we integrated the Narmada scheme with local irrigation schemes and ensured the region got water for drinking and irrigation purposes. The BJP has walked the talk and will keep doing so in future too.”

He said Narmada water would be lifted to a height equalling nearly 55 storeys to supply water to the parched Aravalli and Sabarkantha regions.

No time for mom?

It was speculated the PM would meet his mother Hiraba during his trip to the state. However, this is the second consecutive time Modi has skipped meeting his mother. When he had come to attend the African Development Bank Group annual meeting in May, too, he had not met her. However, he had extended his stay for two hours and met CM Vijay Rupani and deputy CM Nitin Patel at Raj Bhavan.

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