Kanniyakumari, May 30: Prime Minister Narendra Modi has reached Kanniyakumari, where he will meditate at the Vivekananda Rock memorial from this evening to Saturday evening.
The Prime Minister will meditate at the Dhyan Mandapam, the same spot where the Hindu philosopher-saint Swami Vivekananda had meditated in 1892 to get a clear vision of the future of India.
It is also the meeting point of the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal, and the Arabian Sea and BJP leaders said the choice of Kanniyakumari gives out a signal of national unity.
Over 2,000 police personnel have been posted around the memorial to ensure the PM’s security, and the Coast Guard and the Navy will also maintain vigil.
Campaigning for the last phase of the Lok Sabha polls ended at 5 pm today and the PM had also undertaken a spiritual sojourn to Kedarnath – where he had meditated in a cave – when the silent period began before the last phase of the 2019 elections.
The polling, scheduled for June 1, includes all 13 seats of Punjab and four of Himachal Pradesh, 13 constituencies in Uttar Pradesh, nine in West Bengal, eight in Bihar, six in Odisha, and three seats in Jharkhand, along with Chandigarh.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is vying for a third consecutive term from Varanasi.
Modi, concluding his campaign with meditation in Kanyakumari until June 1, held 206 public outreach programs since the Election Commission announced the election schedule on March 16.
The PM’s meditation plan has also sparked a political row.
The BJP has hit back and said the INDIA alliance’s opposition to the PM’s meditation plan betrays its ‘anti-Sanatan mindset’.
“If someone wants to go for meditation, that too when the election campaign ends on May 30, because that person took inspiration from Swami Vivekananda, why is the Congress party calling it a violation of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC)?” BJP National Spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla told ANI.
“It is because of the anti-Hindu attitude of the Congress. A party like Trinamool Congress is also opposing Swami Vivekananda… People say that he (Rahul Gandhi) often goes abroad for meditation, he can go there at his center of faith and no one stops him,” he added.
