Turnout cloud on Gita event, Lokkho Konthe Gita Path, at the Brigade Parade Grounds on Sunday

 Show ‘lost steam’ after Modi cancellation

The Gita reading session underway at the Maidan in Calcutta on Sunday: Picture by Gautam Bose

Snehamoy Chakraborty, Saibal Gupta, TT, Calcutta, 25.12.23 : The saffron ecosystem’s much-hyped event “Lokkho Konthe Gita Path (reading of the Gita by one lakh voices)”, organised at the Brigade Parade Grounds here on Sunday, ended amid complaints of low turnout and lack of facilities.

Although the event was organised by three organisations — the Sanatan Sanskriti Sansad, the Matilal Bharat Tirtha Seba Mission Ashram and the Akhil Bharatiya Sanskrit Parishad — it was essentially an attempted show of strength by Bengal BJP with frontbenchers Sukanta Majumdar and Suvendu Adhikari.

A source said the event lost direction after Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was scheduled to come, cancelled it earlier in the week, citing another engagement. Modi met around 250 students from Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday in Delhi.

“Although Modiji did not come, he sent a letter congratulating the initiative, which was widely circulated by our leaders on mainstream and social media. But we think it was good he did not come, as the turnout was nowhere close to one lakh,” admitted a BJP leader in private.

Administrative sources put the crowd count at less than 40,000. There were 20 blocks to seat 5,000 people each for the Gita reading. Only seven blocks were full, a visit to the venue revealed.

Adhikari said otherwise. “I feel spiritually enriched after attending the ‘Lokkho Kanthe Gita Path’ at Brigade Parade Ground. The extraordinary initiative aimed at mass recitation of Bhagavad Gita by a record one lakh devotees was successfully organised," he said.

Many participants started leaving before the event even began, citing mismanagement.

“We came from Malda, travelling overnight by train. We were supposed to get transport from the station to the venue, but did not. They delayed the event's start. We did not get food. Hence we are leaving,” said Haimanti Roy, a participant.

Bhagirath Banerjee, who came from South 24-Parganas’s Basanti, added: "I am sure this mismanagement would not have taken place if Modiji had come."

A Birbhum BJP leader said the party promised two trains from Rampurhat to bring participants to Calcutta. “Trains were not given once it was known Modiji would not come,” he said.

BJP leaders claimed the Trinamul-led state government tried its best to stop people and organised the TET on Sunday.

“All such moves by Trinamul failed, and well over a lakh attended the event,” Adhikari said.

Trinamul mocked the BJP over turnout. “They could have held the event in a local park instead of Brigade, as merely 3,750 people took part in the recitation. Narendra Modi realised how poor the attendance would be, and hence skipped,” said Trinamul's Kunal Ghosh.

The Congress and the CPM held readings of the Constitution across the state on Sunday.