Unlike the demand for Chhattisgarh state, the demand for the railway zone at Bilaspur had seen violent agitations and property worth hundreds of crores of rupees had been damaged. At one stage, all ministers from the Bilaspur region had been submitted their resignations from the Digvijay Singh cabinet. They agreed to stay on only after the Chief Minister assured them that he would persuade the Centre to allocate a railway zone to Bilaspur.

Digvijay Singh tried his best to convince the then prime minister P V Narasimha Rao, and later H D Deve Gowda, but in vain.

AICC spokesman Ajit Jogi was reported to have announced earlier this month thatif a railway zone for Bilaspur was announced by September 15, the BJP would have a major impact in all the 19 seats in Bilaspur district. His words seem to have come true.

The BJP, it appears, has decided to pay special attention to Chhattisgarh region, a traditional Congress stronghold. The region has 90 Assembly constituencies. After Vajpayee lays the foundation stone of the new railway zone on September 20, Home Minister L K Advani will visit Bilaspur on October 4 to address a division level party rally. Efforts are also being made to arrange another Prime Ministerial visit to the Chhattisgarh region to address one of the rallies in early October, according to Jain.

Railway Minister Nitish Kumar will lay the foundation stone for a railway terminal at Raigarh on September 14. The same day he will inaugurate the construction work of the 23-km Vishrampur-Ambikapur railway line aimed at linking the Surguja district headquarters with the railway network. Vajpayee is also expected, on September 20, to startwork on the Rewa-Singrauli railway line.

Seven yatras of the State BJP, led by senior leaders, are at present traversing the length and width of Madhya Pradesh, with the objective of educating the people on the ``misrule'' of the Digvijay Singh Government. These yatras complete their itineraries by September 19. Early next month the party has planned big division level rallies all over the State. Vajpayee, Advani and Sushma Swaraj, among others, are scheduled to address these rallies.

The steadily deteriorating law and order situation and rampant corruption during the Digvijay Singh regime are the major issues being highlighted by the BJP leaders. Jain said that the State Government's overdraft had gone up from around Rs 7,000 crore to Rs 20,000 crore in the five years of Digvijay Singh's rule. He demanded a white paper on the finances of the State so that the people would know how much of the State budget had actually been spent on development works in the last five years.