Rahul set to give Cong an UP-swing

UP IN ARMS: The Congress MP from Amethi, Rahul Gandhi, kick-started the party's poll campaign from Ghaziabad.

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New Delhi: The crucial Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls are around the corner and the Congress is now getting into battle gear.

Desperate to revive its fortunes in the political bellwether state, the Congress has decided to play its trump card during the election campaign — Rahul Gandhi.

The 37-year-old Congress MP from Amethi, Rahul Gandhi, kick-started the party's poll campaign from Ghaziabad on Sunday.

The polling for the first phase will be held on April 7. The UP Assembly polls will be held in seven phases.

In all likelihood, the polls will witness a four-cornered contest, with the incumbent Samajwadi Party making a valiant effort to retain power and the Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party trying to emerge as the single largest party.

The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress will be the two other main contenders in the race.

As part of his campaigning, Rahul promised a "new vision" and a "golden future" for the state.

"I have decided to work shoulder to shoulder with you all to end 15 years of misrule here. UP has been the cradle of development and all good things that has happened to the country including independence struggle," PTI quoted him as saying.

"I am here with a new vision and dream to restore the glory of the state," he was further quoted.

The Gandhi scion is scheduled to cover as many as 32 constituencies in the Western UP belt over three days.

The roadshow will cover areas where Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party have a strong presence. The Congress' efforts for an electoral tie up with the RLD have so far not succeeded.

The party's decision to rope in Rahul for UP's electoral battleground comes after an embarrassing defeat in two states — Punjab and Uttarakhand.

Even Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has admitted that UP, , where it has been out of power for nearly two decades now, continues to be a difficult challenge.