NR makes extensive arrangements for BSP rally

Lucknow, Oct 5 (UNI) The Northern Railway has made extensive arrangements for the October 9 'Savdhan raho aage barho' Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) rally to be hild here.

Talking to newsmen here, DRM (Northern Railway) Chahte Ram said so far he has received ''indications'' that two special trains would run from Mathura and Agra to Lucknow for the rally.

''We have asked the state government to ensure that railway feeders get constant power supply so that we do not have to switch over to generators as it takes around four minutes to start up the system which would leave the platforms in dark,'' he said. The DRM claimed that with so many people on the platforms, it would not be safe to have black out even for a few minutes.

The NR has also made arrangements for additional lighting at the railway station and portable water coolers.

Meanwhile, 15 additional counters would be set up between October 8 and October 9 at the railway station to cater to the needs of routine passengers and ralliests.

Earlier this morning state principal secretary(home) J N Chamber and director general of police (DGP) Vikram Singh visited Charbagh railway station and reviewed the arrangements to be made for the ralliests.

The rally, first to be held in the present BSP regime which received absolute majority in the March-April assembly polls with a new political equations between Dalits and Brahmins, is expected to draw huge support base of the party, both from the state and other parts of the country.

An attendence of about 15 lakh is expected in the rally.

''This time the party has made fool-proof arrangements for the stay of the party supporters and hope that the function would be incident free'', the leader added.

BSP held its last political rally on March 1, just before the Assembly polls when about ten lakh people made their presence felt in the political gathering.

For Tuesday's rally, about 5000 to 10000 supporters from each of the 403 Assembly constituencies would be attending the gathering while about two lakh BSP supporters from outside the state are expected participate in the rally.

Large contingent of police including PAC have been sought from other parts of the state to control the crowd and to maintain law and order situation. Around 55 companies of PAC are likely to be deputed for crowd control. The PAC personnel will be housed in government schools for three days. Rs 2.5 crore will be spent on the 'langars' (kitchens) for the PAC personnel.

After this week's stampede at Mugalsaria railway station in which 15 women were crushed to death, railway department was taking no risk in controlling the rally crowd particularly at the Charbagh railway station.

On September 28, 2002, more than 30 BSP supporters were killed in a stampede at the Charbagh station when they were returning after attending a party rally here.

UNI