By IANS,
Lucknow : Congress party workers in the Uttar Pradesh capital celebrated the birthday of party general secretary Rahul Gandhi by distributing saplings in front of the Vidhan Sabha (legislative assembly).
The workers plan to distribute over 100,000 saplings in the next seven days, requesting the residents of Lucknow to help them make the city green again, said Anu Awasthi, the spokesperson of the party’s youth wing.
“You can very well see how Chief Minister Mayawati has turned the city into a stone city,” she added.
The proceedings to celebrate Rahul’s 39th birthday began 7 a.m. with a motorcycle rally, comprising 300 youth on 150 odd motorcycles, starting from the party’s state headquarters and covering almost the entire city, before reaching the assembly building in the afternoon.
Party workers also distributed sweets and foods in areas inhabited by Dalits and poor.
“We also organised an hour-long firework display in the evening at the party’s state headquarters,” Awasthi added.
Similar celebrations were also reported from Allahabad where hundreds of party workers, most of them wearing masks of Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as well as Rahul, gathered outside his ancestral house, Anand Bhawan, where a cake was cut.
“The Lok Sabha results are definitely a sign of a positive change for the state and we wish that Rahul was here to share our emotions,” senior Congress leader Pramod Tiwari said.