Rahul Gandhi visits temple 1 km away from Babri Masjid site

NEW DELHI: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi became the first member of his political family to visit Ayodhya since the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992. Rahul is presently on a ‘kisan yatra’ as part of his campaign for the coming Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.The last member of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty to visit Ayodhya was Rajiv Gandhi , in 1990.However, other members of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty have come close. Congress chief Sonia Gandhi had addressed a rally in Faizabad, about 7 km from Agra, ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in 2014.Varun Gandhi, who represents the nearby Sultanpur Constituency in the Lok Sabha, had been scheduled to take part in BJP rallies in Ayodhya on multiple occasions before, but had skipped them.Rahul’s visit to the Hanumangarhi temple, less than 1 km away from the site of the Babri Masjid, may be seen as an attempt steeped in symbolism. The Congress is a mere shadow of the powerful organisation it used to be in Uttar Pradesh, and is attempting to pull in a significant showing in the Assembly elections, scheduled for 2017.