Lucknow: UPA's Presidential nominee Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday campaigned in the key state of Uttar Pradesh where its outside supporter and ruling Samajwadi has pledged its support.
Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav hosted a lunch in honour of Mukherjee at his official residence. The former Finance Minister, who is here as part of his election campaign, also met over tea MLAs of Congress, RLD and other allies.
UP accounts for around 1.62 lakh votes of the total electoral college of 10.98 lakh votes.
The Presidential elections in which Mukherjee's rival will be Opposition-backed candidate and former Lok Sabha Speaker P A Sangma are slated to be held on July 19. The Congress stalwart is widely expected to win the contest.
Mukherjee, who reached here this afternoon, went straight from the airport to the CM's 5 Kalidas Marg residence where all members of the UP Legislature, including ministers, were invited over lunch by Akhilesh.
While SP and Congress members along with MLAs of other parties attended the lunch, BSP and BJP members skipped the event.
MLAs of smaller parties, including Mukhtar Ansari of Kaumi Ekta Dal and Anupriya Patel of Apna Dal also attended the lunch.
SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and senior ministers, including Mohd Azam Khan, were among those present.
Among Congress leaders, Union Coal Minister Shriprakash Jaiswal, Union Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajiv Shukla, UPPCC president Rita Bahuguna Joshi and CLP leader Pramod Tiwari attended the lunch.
Before leaving for Delhi, Mukherjee is due to attend a dinner hosted by BSP supremo Mayawati at her residence where he would also meet the party MLAs and MLCs.
Congress managers expect most of the votes from UP barring some 40 MLAs of the BJP and some MPs of that party, to come to Mukherjee.
The Congress stalwart has already canvassed in Tamil Nadu (Chennai) and Andhra Pradesh (Hyderabad) and after Lucknow he would go to Kerala tomorrow followed by visits to Rajasthan and Gujarat on Thursday.
He is expected to visit Assam and Tripura on July six. Mukherjee is expected to visit his home state of West Bengal on July nine.
However, there is still no official word on whether he would have a meeting with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who has opposed his candidature. Mamata said a final decision on her party's stand on the Presidential elections would be taken three days before the elections.
This will be followed by a meeting with MPs and MLAs of Uttarakhand and Delhi on July 10. The next day he is expected to be in Bhopal and Raipur.
Mukherjee is likely to visit Mumbai on July 13 but it is still not clear whether he would meet Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray, who has declared support to him in national interest.
He is expected to visit Srinagar and Chandigarh on July 15, the last day of his campaign for the July 19 Presidential election.
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