Rawat holds march in Kumaon; defies high command’s directive

Dehradun: Defying the Congress High Command’s directive, former Uttarakhand chief minister Harish Rawat led a march in Jaspur, Udham Singh Nagar district, on Monday and said he would explain it to the party’s leadership in Delhi on Wednesday.

In a post on X, Rawat on Monday said, “It’s possible I have not been able to explain my point properly. Selja ji (Uttarakhand Congress in-charge) has given me time to meet on October 7 at 7 pm, and the party has the right to seek clarification.”

Rawat organised this march following a letter from Congress General Secretary and Uttarakhand party in-charge Kumari Selja, in which she had advised him against proceeding with these programmes. In her letter, Selja had noted that the party needs to present a united front for the upcoming assembly elections due in the coming months.

She had said, “You (Rawat) will understand that, at this juncture, any such parallel programme would not be in the party’s interest.” The senior Congress leader, however, emphasised that he could not understand how his ‘Dhanyavad evam Jansamvad Yatra’ was affecting the party’s programmes. There are no Congress programmes currently underway and no organised public outreach campaign is visible across the state, he said, questioning how his march was weakening the party’s programmes.

Earlier, the yatra — undertaken despite the High Command’s strict instruction against organising ‘parallel programmes’ — saw the participation of former state president, Chakrata MLA, and Uttarakhand election campaign committee chairman Pritam Singh; Jaspur MLA Aadesh Chauhan; and numerous other leaders and party workers. During the march, Rawat said that his objective was to work towards ousting the BJP governments from both Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh. Rawat noted that every key figure within the Congress party participated in the event in some capacity, and the march boosted party workers’ morale. Expressing gratitude for the grand welcome, the Congress leader said, “Jaspur’s support for this journey is as

solid as a rock.