Ahmedabad:

Former PM and senior congress leader Dr. Manmohan Singh would begin his election campaign in Gujarat tomorrow.

In fact, the speculations started after the sudden change in the venue of his first event in Gujarat before polls.

Dr Singh will be addressing the representatives of small and medium businesses as the sole event in Gujarat in Ahmedabad tomorrow.

His event was to be held in Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industries(GCCI) premises and Congress had even circulated written information about it. But now the venue has been shifted to Sardar Patel Memorial in Shahibaug.

Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi today confirmed that the venue has been shifted. He did not attribute any definite reason for it.

However, another Congress leader said that many of the Chamber officials were supporters of the ruling BJP and were not co-operating which led to the change of venue. There were certain booking issue too.

GCCI president Shailesh Patwari on the other hand cited a different reason for it. ‘The change in venue was unfortunate. In fact we had made it clear to Congress leaders that the sitting capacity of our auditorium was 350. Later they said that there will be over 1000 people. It was not possible for us to accommodate such a gathering. There was nothing like BJP-Congress in it. The security check etc of our premises for the former PM’s event was already done but now it has been shifted. We respect Dr Singh as an economist and our former PM,’ he said.

Notably, Congress which has made GST and Demonetization as two of its main poll planks in Gujarat, is trying to cash-in on these issues by pitching in Dr Singh.

DeshGujarat