Rahul Gandhi feels the power of Kedarnath temple

Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi who completed 16 km-trek to the famous Kedarnath shrine in Uttarakhand said he hopes his journey will help boost tourism in the state, which was ravaged by floods two years ago.

"I wanted to walk the distance as a tribute to the people who died in the tragedy in 2013 and said he turned down the offer to use a government helicopter to fly to the temple, which opened today for pilgrims.I usually don't ask for anything when I visit a temple... but today, I felt a power at the shrine that was like a fire inside me," Mr Gandhi said.

Gandhi began his trek yesterday and spent the night at a government-run shelter, about 7 km from the temple which he visited this morning, accompanied by Chief Minister Harish Rawat. Uttarakhand is one of the few states where the Congress is in power; nearly 6000 people were killed in the rains and landslides that flooded the hilly state two years ago.

The 44-year-old Congress vice president recently returned to Parliament after a controversial leave of absence that lasted nearly two months. Since then, he has joined his mother and party chief Sonia Gandhi on leading the Congress protests in and outside Parliament against the government's land reforms, which opposition parties including Congress have described as "anti-farmer."