BJP to take out yatra for fishermen from Aug 16: Rupala

Rajkot, Aug 4 (UNI) In the run-up to the assembly elections in Gujarat, the BJP is all set to launch a 'yatra' from August 16 to propagate 'Sagar Khedu Welfare Scheme' (Fishermen Welfare Scheme).

Talking to mediapersons here today in a 'meet the press' programme, president of Gujarat unit of BJP Purshotam Rupala said his party would embark upon a string of 'yatras' to woo the community of fishermen.

The yatra would cover districts such as Bhavnagar, Amreli, Valsad, Navsari, Bharuch, Anand, Junagadh, Porbandar, Ahmedabad, Jamnagar and Rajkot. It would conclude on August 26 after covering nearly 2,000 villages, he said.

He said Sagarkhedu -- the Rs 11,000 crore project of the state government for the development and welfare of the coastal poor -- would generate more development opportunities for the coastal belt.

When asked about growing dissidents in the party, Mr Rupala said the party would take apporpriate action against them, as it had taken against the five dissident MLAs earlier.

Meanwhile, BJP spokesman and Rajya Sabha MP Vijay Rupani refuted as ''baseless'' the reports in a section of media regarding Chief Minister Narendra Modi threatening to resign from the post over dissidents issue.

''The Chief Minister neither had talks with Rajnath Singh by telephone nor threatened to resign from the post. The news reports are baseless and meant only to demoralise the party workers,'' he said.

The reports that appeared in some newspapers today said Mr Modi had telephonic talks with the BJP national president Rajnath Singh.

During the conversation, he threatened to resign from the post in the wake of the anti-party activities of a section of BJP leaders.

Mr Rupani said the next Chief Minister of Gujarat would be only ''Narendra Modi''.

Under his able leadership, the BJP would fight the forthcoming assembly elections, he clarified.

Referring to the newspaper reports regarding a survey undertaken by the BJP, which had forecast that the party would have only 33 seats in the assembly elections if early polls were conducted, Mr Rupani said the BJP's national party spokesman Prakash Javadekar had already denied them.

The BJP had not conducted any such survey under any private agency, he added.

UNI