Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a massive roadshow in Kerala’s Palakkad on Tuesday morning in a bid to rally support for the BJP candidates in Palakkad, Ponnani, and Malappuram in the April 26 Lok Sabha polls.
The roadshow that commenced from Kottamaidan Anjuvilakku junction at 10.30 am ended before the head post office in the town after covering a distance of 1.5 km.
BJP state president K Surendran, Palakkad candidate C Krishnakumar, and candidate of the adjacent Ponnani constituency, Niveditha Subramanian, also accompanied the prime minister in the open vehicle, heavily decorated with flowers.
Although the BJP had announced that its Malappuram candidate, M Abdul Salam, would also accompany PM Modi in the roadshow, Salam was dropped presumably because of the lack of space in the vehicle.
Braving scorching heat, thousands lined up alongside the road to see glimpses of Prime Minister Modi showering flowers and cheering “Modi, Modi” as he passed by them. At times, Modi threw back a handful of flower petals to the crowds.
In a white half-sleeve cotton kurti with a black lotus badge on the chest and a shawl with black borders hanging around his neck, Modi sported a saffron cap with a patch of embroidery on it.
Earlier at 10.20 am, BJP’s Kerala Prabhari Prakash Javadekar and state President K Surendran received the PM, who landed at Palakkad Mercy College ground, in a helicopter from Coimbatore.
This is Modi’s fifth visit to Kerala since January. He has been expressing hopes that the BJP, which is yet to have any Lok Sabha MP from the state, will win a ‘double-digit’ number of seats this time. Palakkad is one of the seats in Kerala on which the BJP is pinning high hopes.