The cut-outs are up, the welcome gates have been erected and hotel rooms booked as this Jharkhand capital gets ready for the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) rally and three-day national executive meeting beginning Wednesday.

BJP leaders are expecting a crowd of 500,000 at the city's Mohrabadi ground Wednesday afternoon. The national executive committee meeting will begin in the evening.

The local BJP leadership is setting much store by the rally, coming as it does before the assembly elections due early next year. It is to be attended by former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and BJP president L.K Advani,

This is the first major BJP rally since the state was carved out of Bihar four years ago. And the ruling party is making sure that everything goes off according to plan.

Besides cut-outs of the big two -- Vajpayee and Advani -- coming up in various parts of the city alongside giant welcome gates, BJP workers are busy arranging for people from all over the state to attend the rally.

Buses are being arranged to ferry the people and hotel rooms have been booked to accommodate the 250 leaders expected to attend the national executive committee meeting. That it is the peak wedding season has made the task a little more difficult, but the stage is set.

"The preparations for the rally and national executive committee meeting have almost been completed. We are glad that the national executive meeting is taking place in the state," said Raghubar Das, state BJP president.

The national executive meeting is said to be crucial to chart out the roadmap for the party's future plans. Immediate issues like the arrest of the Kanchi Shankaracharya and the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government's performance in view of factors like the gas price hike will figure. But so will the strategy for the assembly elections in Bihar and Jharkhand.

Said senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha: "The meeting will discuss the upcoming assembly elections in Bihar and Jharkhand. The results of the Maharashtra and Arunachal Pradesh poll, internal security and other issues will also be discussed."

However, he ruled out any discussion on the alienation of former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Uma Bharati and her open rebellion against Advani.