The Congress stands with the people of Manipur and wants to make the state peaceful and harmonious again, former party chief Rahul Gandhi said on Monday as he interacted with the people on the second day of his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra.
Starting the yatra this morning in a custom-made Volvo bus, Gandhi also walked for some distance meeting people and enquiring about their problems.
Several people, a number of them women and children, had lined up along the yatra route and cheered on Gandhi as his bus made its way along several busy areas in Senapati.
Addressing the people from atop his bus in Senapati, Gandhi said the Congress did a yatra from Kanyakumari to Kashmir and the idea was to bring people of India together.
It was a very successful yatra where we walked over 4,000 km, he said.
"We wanted to do another yatra from east to west and we decided that the most powerful thing would be to start the yatra from Manipur so that the people of India get a sense of what the people of Manipur have been through, the difficulty that they have been through, the struggles they have been through," the Congress leader said.
"I understand that you have faced a tragedy, you have lost family members, you have lost property and I want you to know that we are fully standing with you, we want to bring peace back to Manipur. We want to make Manipur peaceful and harmonious again," Gandhi said.
He said he has been speaking with delegations from the state who have been telling him about the issues the people of Manipur have been facing.
"I hope peace returns to Manipur as soon as possible," Gandhi added.
In a post on X, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh earlier said, "Day 2 of the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra began bright and early at 7:30 am with the traditional flag hoisting by Seva Dal at the campsite. PCC President of Manipur @meghachandra_k hoisted the flag."
"The yatra will move from Sekmai to Kangpokpi and then Senapati in Manipur before finally halting in Nagaland at night," he said.
The yatra began Sunday from violence-hit Manipur with Gandhi asserting that the party will present a new vision for India that will be based on harmony, brotherhood and equitability and devoid of hatred, violence and monopoly.
At a rally in Thoubal on Sunday to flag off the over-6,700-km yatra with which the party is looking to set the narrative for the Lok Sabha polls, Gandhi and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for not visiting Manipur as it reeled under ethnic violence, and vowed to ensure justice for its people.
The ethnic violence in the northeastern state, which broke out in May last year, has claimed more than 180 lives and rendered thousands homeless.
The Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra will pass through 100 Lok Sabha constituencies in 15 states. It will traverse 6,713 km, mostly in buses but also on foot, and culminate in Mumbai on March 20 or 21.
