Priyanka holds marathon meeting with party workers

Taking a break of just a few hours after night-long discussions with party workers, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra Wednesday resumed the exercise, prepping the party in eastern Uttar Pradesh for the coming Lok Sabha elections. When asked by reporters about a `muqabla' (contest) with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the newly appointed AICC office bearer said, "Kar to rahe hein Rahulji, Modiji se muqabla (Rahul Gandhi is already taking on Modi)."

She also played down the questioning of her husband Robert Vadra by the Enforcement Directorate in Jaipur, in connection with an alleged land scam in Rajasthan's Bikaner district. "These things will keep on happening, I am doing my own work," she said.

On her marathon meeting with party workers, Priyanka Gandhi said she is happy to see the enthusiasm among them. "I am learning a lot about the organisation and how it is structured. I am getting views on how to fight the elections," she said.

Forty-one of the Lok Sabha constituencies in the state have been placed under her charge and the remaining 39 under Jyotiraditya Scindia. Priyanka Gandhi and Scindia were appointed AICC general secretaries for UP east and UP west respectively in January and took charge last week.

Among the constituencies placed under Priyanka Gandhi's charge are the key seats of Lucknow, Amethi, Rae Bareli, Sultanpur, Gorakhpur, Varanasi, Phulpur, Allahabad, Barabanki, and Kushinagar. Saharanpur, Kairana, Muzaffarnagar, Moradabad, Ghaziabad, Mathura, Pilibhit, Dhaurahra, Kanpur and Farrukhabad are some of the key constituencies in Scindia's charge.

Later, in the day, representatives of a pensioners' association met her, asking for the revival of a pension scheme replaced with a new one under the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. Ajay Kumar Bandhu, who heads the National Movement for Old Pension Scheme (NMOPS), said the employees are against the new scheme under which a part of the funds is invested in stocks.

Bandhu caimed Priyanka Gandhi assured the delegation that the old pension system will be implemented if the Congress is voted to power. PTI NAV SAB SMI PTI ASH

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