'Will win 370 seats': PM at tribal outreach event

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alone will win 370 seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at his first election rally in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday, where he also predicted a complete decimation of the Congress.

- Shruti Tomar

Addressing a rally in the tribal-dominated Jhabua, Modi said that even opposition leaders in Parliament are now saying "abki baar 400 paar (we will cross 400 this time)" for the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

"I am sure the BJP's lotus symbol will cross the 370-mark on its own," Modi said.

The PM said he has not come to Jhabua to campaign for the Lok Sabha elections, but as a "sevak". "I have not come for Lok Sabha campaigning. I have come as a servant to express the gratitude to the people of MP, who are like God," he said.

The Congress was decimated in the 2023 assembly polls and will be wiped out in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, he said.

"The people showed a mirror to the Congress in the assembly polls. The mood of the nation is similar in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls... that is why this time the big leaders of the opposition have already started saying 'Abki Baar 400 Paar' in 2024," Modi said, referring to the 2023 state polls in MP where it returned to power with 163 seats in the 230-member assembly.

In the same round of polls last December, viewed as a curtain raiser for this summer's general elections, the BJP also managed to dislodge the Congress governments in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.

"Our 'double-engine' government is working with double speed in Madhya Pradesh," he said, referring to the 7,550 crore development projects that he launched before addressing the meeting. The PM also laid the foundation stone of Tantya Mama Bhil University to be built at a cost of 170 crore in Khargone from Jhabua itself.

The BJP has often used the term "double-engine" for its governments at the Centre and state levels.