Modi, who had vowed to punish culprits of the Pahalgam terror attack at a rally in Madhubani district last month, led a massive roadshow in the city after arriving in the poll-bound state on a two-day visit.
The PM was received at the airport by Governor Arif Mohammad Khan, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Deputy CMs Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha.
At the airport, the PM inaugurated its new terminal, built at a cost of Rs 1,200 crore, and laid the foundation stone for a new civil enclave at Bihta, on the outskirts of the city.
The two projects together involve an expenditure of Rs 2,613 crore and promise a “world-class experience” to travellers.
The roadshow began thereafter from outside the Aranya Bhawan near the airport and concluded at the state BJP office on Birchand Patel Marg, around 4 km away. The journey took more than an hour as the PM’s vehicle moved at a snail’s pace.Thousands of people gathered on two sides of the road and on rooftops to catch a glimpse of Modi, who greeted them from inside his car with folded hands and a wave.Huge posters and banners, with the PM’s picture alongside the bold inscription ‘Operation Sindoor’, which saw Indian armed forces destroying terror hideouts deep inside Pakistan, dotted the route.
Security personnel frantically tried to keep pace with the PM’s vehicle, amid showers of flower petals by people standing behind barricades, many of whom waved the national flag and chanted “Bharat Mata Ki Jai”.
Among the bystanders were a sizeable number of women in saffron turbans, blowing conch shells.
They also had their foreheads smeared with a generous amount of ‘sindoor’, which has come to be seen as a metaphor for the military operation against those behind the dastardly attack, in which more than 20 tourists were segregated from their wives and shot dead after being made to reveal the faith to which they belonged.
“We are here to thank the PM, on behalf of Bihar’s women, for demonstrating to the world the power of sindoor,” said one such group of spectators.
At the BJP office, the PM is meeting the party’s state leaders who face the crucial assembly polls in a few months.
Modi is expected to retire for the night at the Raj Bhavan and leave for Rohtas district on Friday morning when he is scheduled to launch projects worth more than Rs 45,000 crore, besides addressing a rally.
