Mumbai, May 16 (IANS) As the Lok Sabha elections' fifth phase campaign enters the crescendo stage, top leaders of the national opposition alliance INDIA bloc and Maha Vikas Aghadi will address a mammoth rally here on Friday.
Among the top leaders who will attend and address the public meeting at Bandra Kurla Complex grounds include Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, Nationalist Congress Party (SP) President Sharad Pawar, Shiv Sena (UBT) President and ex-CM Uddhav Thackeray.
Besides, there will be Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and representatives of other constituents of the INDIA-MVA alliance.
In addition, other senior MVA leaders like Nana Patole, Sanjay Raut and Jayant Patil are expected to speak at the rally, coming just three days ahead of the fifth phase of Lok Sabha polls on May 20, covering 13 constituencies, including the crucial Mumbai Metropolitan Region.
An MVA leader claimed that Friday's rally would be the biggest combined opposition show of strength in the state since the poll campaign started and people are expected to participate from all over the state.
This is the second INDIA-MVA multi-party rally coming two months after a similar show of strength held in Mumbai on March 17, marking the end of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra.
In the last two months after the Lok Sabha elections were announced on March 16, INDIA-MVA top leaders have addressed several rallies, public meetings across Maharashtra in the 48 Parliamentary constituencies -- the second highest in the country.
They included Kharge, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi, Sharad Pawar, Thackeray and other senior leaders of various parties canvassing for the alliance and respective party candidates in the state.
So far, in the past four phases of elections in Maharashtra, voting was completed for 5 seats (April 19), 8 seats (April 26), 7 constituencies each (May 7 and May 13), while the final and biggest round of voting for 13 seats is scheduled for Monday (May 20).