Timeline of Bharat Jodo Yatra

Congress's Bharat Jodo Yatra started from Kanyakumari and ended in Srinagar in January 2023.[1] Bharat Jodo Yatra covered 4,080 kilometres (2,540 miles) .[2] There are several parallels between the Congress's 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' and ex-prime minister of India Chandra Shekhar's nearly 4,260 kilometres-long Bharat Yatra in 1983.[3][4][5]

Bharat Jodo Yatra entered Kerala on September 10 evening, witnessing a huge turnout in the state, especially in Thiruvananthapuram, where a huge number of citizens participated in the yatra.[6][7][8] On 28 September, the Bharat Jodo Yatra entered Wayanad in Kerala, Rahul Gandhi's constituency. Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said that a "new, young, and aggressive Congress" will emerge at the end of the yatra. He also added that the yatra will act like a booster dose for the party. "This is a part of the revival plan for Congress".[9]

The Bharat Jodo Yatra for early-September 2022 was the jobs crisis[10] in India, with Rahul Gandhi questioning why 42% of Indian youth are unemployed.[11]

The march protested[12] the unprecedented costs of fuel[13] and cooking gas[14] in India during September 2022.

Starting from late-September 2022, the Yatra focused on women's safety,[15] a theme that the women and youth wings of the Congress sought to highlight after the murder of Ankita Bhandari, a 19 year old receptionist at a Uttarakhand resort owned by Pulkit Arya, son of a local BJP leader, who reportedly resisted demands by Arya that she "offer special services" to certain guests.[16]

Rahul Gandhi and the march celebrated the 153rd birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi at Badanavalu, a village the latter had visited in 1927.[17] Rahul Gandhi interacted with the women weavers at the Khadi manufacturing centre there and also laid the last stretch of a 180 metre long road that finally connected two communities who had been at loggerheads with each other in the village since 1993. On 3 October 2022, Congress Party launched its Bharat Jodo App to provide all the information about the Bharat Jodo Yatra.[18][19]

Sonia Gandhi, interim president of the Congress party, joined the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Karnataka on 6 October 2022. Despite ill-health that prevented her from appearing in public in 2022, she undertook a symbolic march along with Yatra participants for a while, her first public roadshow since one in 2016 in Varanasi.[20]

The yatra highlighted the importance of organ donation on 12 October 2022. Rahul Gandhi walked with the families of several donors, including Sanchari Vijay, who had passed away but whose organs saved other lives. Gandhi also noted the generosity of Dr. Rajkumar and his son, Puneeth Rajkumar, both of whom had donated their eyes. 33 participants in the yatra took the pledge to donate their eyes.[21] The rate of organ donation in India, at approximately 0.08 per million population, is relatively low.[22]