Priyanka beats Yogi in holding poll rallies in UP

Lucknow: Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra addressed 209 rallies and roadshows, the maximum by any top leader during the Uttar Pradesh election campaign, followed closely by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath who spoke at 203 poll events.

Information collected from party offices, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav held 131 rallies for the candidates of his party and allies.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah also addressed several rallies and took part in roadshows, boosting the party's campaign. Modi addressed 28 of them during the seven-phase elections, the campaign for which lasted over 45 days. The PM spent a night in his Lok Sabha constituency Varanasi and ended his campaign with a rally in Khajuri village of the district before the electioneering ended for the final phase on March 5.

Amit Shah, the master strategist of the 2017 BJP victory in UP, held 54 rallies and roadshows in favour of the BJP and NDA candidates across the state. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, who is also the Lok Sabha MP from Lucknow, held 43 rallies and roadshows. BJP president J P Nadda held 41 poll events.

BSP supremo Mayawati, whose initial "absence" from the campaign triggered much speculation, addressed 18 rallies. As Priyanka Gandhi led her party from the front in a bid to regain its lost ground, her efforts were supplemented only by a virtual rally by her mother and Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

She addressed just one virtual rally for her party candidates fighting from assembly segments under her Lok Sabha constituency Rae Bareli.

She did not physically hit the ground for any of her party candidates anywhere in the State.

Former Congress president and Priyanka Gandhi's brother Rahul Gandhi too made only a guest appearance addressing barely two rallies -- one in Amethi and another in Varanasi.