The Congress party’s ‘Voter Adhikar Yatra,’ led by Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, is set to become a major display of opposition unity in Bihar this week. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Parliamentary Party leader Kanimozhi Karunanidhi are scheduled to join the yatra on August 27, marking a significant show of solidarity from a key southern ally.
The movement, launched on August 17 in Sasaram, Bihar, was planned as a mass movement to bring into the limelight supposed irregularities in the state's voter roll update process and to resist attempts at voter manipulation. By projecting the campaign as a "people's struggle", Gandhi hopes to rally large-scale participation and counter what he has characterised as systemic efforts at disenfranchising parts of the electorate. The yatra has been gradually picking up pace since its initiation, traversing over 1,300 km within 16 days in 20 districts.
Gandhi, along with Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Tejashwi Yadav, has been moving from several districts of Bihar.
Both the leaders have conducted public rallies, met people from various walks of life, and organised rallies to mobilise people. A rally on two-wheelers in Purnea with both Gandhi and Yadav proved to be a symbolic display of people's mobilisation at the grassroots and the youth involvement in the campaign.
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The yatra’s grand finale is slated for September 1, when Rahul Gandhi will address a mass public rally. This concluding event is expected to showcase a united opposition front, drawing leaders from across the INDIA bloc allies. Reports confirm that Chief Minister Stalin and DMK’s Kanimozhi will lend their presence to the campaign on August 27, underlining the southern party’s solidarity with the Congress and its Bihar allies.
With national polls on the horizon, the Congress leader is trying to position himself as a champion of democratic principles and free elections. By featuring regional coalition partners such as the DMK in the foreground, the yatra is being positioned not merely as a protest at the state level but as a nationwide movement to ensure the purity of India's electoral process. Gandhi has been flat out charging the Election Commission of India with colluding with the Bharatiya Janata Party, charging that the party has 'engineered' its victories through "theft of votes".
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