Jabalpur (PTI): Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will kick off the Congress's campaign for the year-end Madhya Pradesh Assembly polls from Jabalpur on Monday after praying at the banks of the Narmada river, a party leader said.

Jabalpur is at the centre of the state's Mahakoshal region, which has a sizable number of tribal voters. In the 2018 Assembly polls, the Congress won 11 of the 13 Scheduled Tribe reserved seats in the eight-district division, with the remaining two bagged by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

"Priyanka ji will launch the party's campaign and Sankalp 2023 by addressing a public meeting at Shahid Smarak at around 11.15 am. She will land here at around 10:30am and head to Gwarighat to pray to Narmada river,” Jabalpur mayor and Congress' city chief Jagat Bahadur Singh earlier told PTI.

En route to the rally venue eight kilometres away, she will garland a statue of Rani Durgavati, who attained martyrdom fighting the Mughals, he said, adding the rally will be attended by at least two lakh persons.

"People in Mahakoshal area or Jabalpur division having eight districts feel neglected by the BJP. We did well (last time) in the area. This time around we are going to sweep the polls," he claimed.

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Mumbai (PTI): Social activist Anna Hazare has said Raghav Chadha and six other Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Rajya Sabha members would not have quit the party had it followed the "right" path.

"Everyone has the right to hold an opinion in a democracy. They (Chadha and others) must have faced some trouble, which is why they left," Hazare told reporters on Friday in Ahilyanagar district of Maharashtra.

AAP Rajya Sabha members Raghav Chadha and Sandeep Pathak addressed a joint press conference in Delhi on Friday, announcing their exit from the Arvind Kejriwal-led party to join the BJP.

Chadha claimed that nearly two-thirds of AAP's Rajya Sabha members had quit the party and would function as a separate faction.

"It is their (AAP leadership’s) fault. Had that party followed the right way, they would not have left," Hazare said.

Hazare reiterated that Chadha and others must have faced difficulties within AAP, and that is why they left. "Had the party gone in the right direction, they would not have quit the party," he added.

"There must be some or the other reason (for their leaving AAP). In a democracy, every person has a view about where to stay and leave," Hazare said.

The Chadha-led exodus marks a significant setback for the Kejriwal-led party since its formation in 2012, which followed the momentum of Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption movement.