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Maurya takes the lead in ‘swacchhta’ push in Ayodhya ahead of Modi’s visit
While chief minister Yogi Adityanath is set to visit the town on Thursday to take stock of the preparedness, deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya has already been camping there since Monday to supervise the arrangements for Modi’s visit.
Massive arrangements are being made to ensure that Ayodhya looks spotless when Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrives there for the inauguration of the international airport in the temple town on December 30.
While chief minister Yogi Adityanath is set to visit the town on Thursday to take stock of the preparedness, deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya has already been camping there since Monday to supervise the arrangements for Modi’s visit.
Ahead of the January 22 Ram temple inauguration by Modi, while over 1,500 safai mitras (sanitation workers) are likely to be engaged, the deployment of senior leaders of the BJP and in the Yogi Adityanath government is, however, aimed at building awareness among the masses about the need to keep Ayodhya clean.
That’s why perhaps Maurya has coined slogans like “jahan janme hain Ram, wahin swacchhta dhaam (Lord Ram’s birthplace is an abode of cleanliness)”. To be sure, his campaign isn’t just about slogans. “He is spending nights in Ayodhya and is up and about early morning every day, taking up swacchhta campaign in different parts of Ayodhya,” an official, who is part of the team that accompanies Maurya during the cleanliness campaign, said.
“Our effort is that each speck of the soil in Lord Ram’s abode is sacred. That’s why we all need to put in efforts to ensure that the place is spotless and clean. It was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who on October 2, 2014, inspired an entire nation to take up ‘swacchhta’ in mission mode. Ayodhya too won’t be left untouched either,” said Maurya, who had started his ‘swacchhta’ campaign from Lata Mangeshkar Crossing on December 25.
On Wednesday, several senior leaders and ministers also arrived in Ayodhya to participate in the cleanliness campaign. They included senior BJP functionaries like state general secretary (organisation) Dharampal Singh, cabinet minister Surya Pratap Shahi, minister of state Satish Chandra Sharma, UP BJP general secretary Sanjay Rai, regional party chief Kamlesh Mishra, district chiefs Sanjeev Singh and Kamlesh Srivastava, BJP MP Lallu Singh, Ayodhya mayor Girish Pati Tripathi, district panchayat chief Roli Singh, lawmakers Ram Chandra Gupta, Ved Prakash Gupta, Dr Amit Singh Chauhan, former mayor Rishikesh Upadhyaya and local leader Abhishek Mishra.
Maurya visited different places in Ayodhya not just cleaning the streets but also collecting the garbage and putting them in disposal bins.
Maurya is also distributing bags made of clothes to the people of Ayodhya urging them to shun plastic bags.
Over the last couple of days, Maurya and others have after starting the campaign from Lata Mangeshkar Crossing also undertaken similar campaign near Ram Janmabhoomi campus, the ghats of Saryu and Ram Ki Paidi and on Wednesday this campaign continued in Asharfi crossing.
