The Janashirvad yatra, which began on July 22 from the Mahakaal temple at Ujjain, will continue till October 27 with breaks in between to enable Chauhan to return to Bhopal to address governmental affairs. Chauhan is using chopper and two well-appointed 'raths', costing around Rs. 2.5 crore, for the yatra.

In all, the CM will be spending about 50 days on the road, travelling around 8000 kms and touching almost all the 230 assembly constituencies in the state.

A clutch of BJP leaders including Prabhat Jha and Anil Dave, among others, are doing the ground work for the Yatra, drawing up itineraries, mobilising local leaders, preparing talking points et al.

The response to the Yatra, so far, has been tremendous-much better than a similar one taken out by Chauhan prior to the 2008 polls. Despite torrential rains, people waited for hours to hear Chauhan in the first and second legs of his yatra. Even his public meeting at Churhat, the pocket borough of Ajay Singh evoked good response. And, the crowds do not seem to be arranged.

They are spontaneous and seem to be genuinely interested in Chauhan and in what he has to say to them.

In his speeches at the roadside and other public meetings, Chauhan is not only recounting the achievements of his government but is also consistently attacking the Congress and its leaders.

He takes adequate care to ensure that he does not use indecent words or hit below the belt. But otherwise, he is quite belligerent. He tries to put the Congress in the dock, not only by recalling the failings of its state government (1993-2003) but also by charging it with hatching a conspiracy to defame the BJP government, using Central agencies like the Income Tax department.

Analysts say many factors are responsible for the unexpectedly warm welcome Chauhan's yatra is getting in the rural hinterland land and in the one-horse towns of the state. The first and foremost among them is Chauhan himself. He is seen as a down-to-earth politician, genuinely interested in working for the welfare of the vulnerable sections of the society; a family man, loyal to his wife and not given to the vices which commonly afflict wielders of power.

His 40-odd 'Panchayats' – which saw artisans, farmers, fishermen, lawyers and various other sections of the people from all over the state gathering at his residence - have won him accolades and personally, there is no graft charge against him. For the last more than a year, he has been showering goodies on every section of the society. Government employees, farmers, students, dalits, women, the poor, tribals none were forgotten. If it means straining the state's resources to the limit, so be it. But the people, obviously, are happy, especially since many of Chauhan's doles have translated into cash in their hands. For the first time in the last at least two decades, the rate of DA of the state government employees is on a par with their Central government counterparts.

The power bills of farmers have been waived off. The students have got laptops and the BPL families are getting wheat and rice for Re 1 and Rs 2 per kg, respectively.

The Congress, on its part, held its 'Shanknad' rally on August 11 at Sagar, which is the seat of the oldest Madhya Pradesh University. The rally was addressed by almost all the key leaders of the state Congress. They included Union Urban Development and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kamal Nath, Union Minister of state Jyotiraditya Scindia, former Chief Minister and Congress general secretary, Digvijay Singh, former state Congress President, Suresh Pachauri, PCC President Kantilal Bhuria, Leader of opposition in the state Vidhan Sabha Ajay Singh and AICC general secretary in-charge for MP Mohan Prakash.

But before reaching Sagar, Kamal Nath and Scindia jointly addressed a public meeting at Guna. Kamal Nath, without taking the name of Scindia, virtually announced that Scindia was the Congress' Chief Ministerial candidate. His words were, 'One of my younger brothers (Digvijay Singh) from Guna has already been the Chief Minister of the state. The future Chief Minister will also be from the same place'. It may be mentioned here that while the ancestral village (Raghogarh) of Digvijay Singh is in Guna district, Scindia represents Guna constituency in the Lok Sabha. Kamal Nath's announcement came as a surprise not only to the common Congressmen but also to the top leaders of the state party. It is very difficult to determine whether Kamal Nath made the announcement after getting clearance from the Congress president or not but when his attention was drawn to Digvijay Singh's repeated stand that a leader chosen by the elected members of the Congress legislature party would become the Chief Minister, Kamal Nath said that Scindia was his personal choice.

Whatever may be the factual position, Kamal Nath's announcement may cause rift in the state Congress. As the matters stand, there are more than one aspirants for the Chief ministership. They include PCC Chief Kantilal Bhuria, leader of Opposition Ajay Singh and now Scindia. Till now, Congress was making sincere efforts to display that various factional leaders are united and their only goal is to capture power.

From Guna both Kamal Nath and Scindia reached Sagar and participated in the 'Shanknaad' rally. All the leaders in their speeches launched a blistering attack on the BJP government. They pointed out that conditions of farmers was pathetic and they were being sent to jails for not paying heavy electricity bills. Digvijay called the BJP government fascist. They recalled that the rate of unemployment has touched a new high in the state. The state has turned into a cesspool of corruption. The revelations about the sorry state of affairs in the pre-medial test board have shown that the corruption has affected even the sensitive area of medical college admissions. More than 1000 candidates could manage to get admissions in medical colleges through fraudulent means. The BJP has no respect for democratic traditions. How they treated the Congress no confidence motion showed that BJP treats system with parliamentary system with contempt. The state is in a pathetic condition and badly needs change. Leaders asked the people to throw out the 'most corrupt and inefficient, anti-people regime' in the general elections, which are due in November this year. (IPA Service)