Lucknow: In a bid to adopt soft Hindutva, the Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Thursday took a holy dip along with her son and daughter in Sangam (Prayagraj) on the auspicious occasion of 'Mauni Amavasya' at the ongoing 57-day-long Magh Mela.
Accompanied by her son Rehan and 18-year-old daughter Miraya, Priyanka landed at Bamrauli Airport in Prayagraj on Thursday morning and drove straight to her ancestral house Anand Bhawan at 11.40 am. She was welcomed by senior party leaders including Pramod Tiwari, party MLA Aradhana Mishra and a large number of Congress workers.
She offered floral tributes to her grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru and great grandfather Motilal Nehru, who stayed at Anand Bhawan, at a memorial in the sprawling campus. Priyanka also spent some time with children of an orphanage, run by Anand Bhawan Trust. She gave photo opportunities to lensmen by carrying a small child in her lap. She stayed in the ancestral house for about two hours to finish some work.
She left for Magh Mela ground. Without any VIP protocol, Priyanka walked barefoot with her son and daughter like other devotees and hired a boat for Rs 2,000 to ride till the other bank of Sangam where she took a holy dip with Rehan and Miraya and offered prayers.
Ignoring advice of her security men, she took off the life jacket to ride the boat herself. She gave another scare to her security men when she broke the security to meet a few girls who were waving at her.
Priyanka made it a personal trip and refused to answer a volley of questions from media men who were waiting since afternoon.
After holy dip at Sangam, she went to Mankameshwar temple at Sarsawati Ghat and offered prayers with her children. They had lunch also at the temple.
Priyanka also called on Swami Swaroopanand ji Maharaj, head of Dwarka-Sharda Peeth, and spoke with him for some time. Swami is vocal against the BJP and Sangh Parivar.
She came to Sangam after two years. Earlier, she had launched 'Jal Yatra' on January 17, 2019. On Wednesday, she addressed a Kisan Panchayat in Chilkana in Saharanpur.
Her Sangam visit for the holy dip is seen as the party's attempt to adopt soft Hindutva to revive Congress fortune in Hindi heartland, particularly Uttar Pradesh.
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