New Delhi: Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge is eyeing to woo the party’s traditional Dalit vote bank and will launch a campaign on July 5 to mobilise the community in 212 select Assembly and 61 Parliamentary constituencies. In October last year, the Congress showcased the election of Kharge, a Dalit leader, to the highest party office as an indicator of its democratic credentials and inclusive politics.
Soon after taking over, Kharge asked senior party functionaries to plan a long-term programme to cultivate and win back the marginalised communities, who had moved to the regional parties in the states. “Kharge will launch the National Leadership Development Mission (LDM) on July 5. We have been working on the programme, which is ready to be rolled out. The party chief will address the LDM managers from across the country and launch an app through which the programme will be monitored,” AICC national coordinator for SC, ST, OBC and Minorities K Raju told ETV Bharat.
According to Raju, though the LDM is a long-term plan, in the short term it will be started in 212 reserved Assembly seats in four states Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Telangana that will go to polls this year. The programme will also be started in 61 reserved Lok Sabha constituencies that will have elections in 2024. The 61 reserved Lok Sabha seats are the ones in which the Congress had polled second in the 2019 polls and where the party will fight in 2024 as well.
Also read: Mallikarjun Kharge meets Cong leaders from Mizoram, says state desires change
“We were second on these 61 Parliamentary seats. We choose them as these seats will not come under any seat-sharing and the Congress will fight elections in 2024 polls there,” said Raju. According to the AICC functionary, the idea of LDM originated during the 2022 Chintan Shivir and later found a place in the Udaipur Declaration, which outlined a roadmap for the Congress’ revival ahead of the 2024 national polls.
“Essentially, the LDM programme aims at expanding the Congress’ social justice agenda across the country. The LDM coordinators will start at the village and block levels. They will work with the locals, take up their issues and win their confidence. They will prepare the ground for the Congress to win the Assembly seats, but will not have any role in the selection of candidates. The regular party system will take care of that issue,” said Raju.
The AICC functionary further said that Kharge was very serious about the plan and therefore appointed full-time coordinators to steer the campaign. “Implementation is key. We have appointed a full-time political leader to coordinate activity in every reserved Assembly seat selected in the four poll-bound states. I visited all 212 seats and trained the coordinators. For the Parliamentary seats, a board has been formed to coordinate the LDM programme. The district unit heads and the frontal organisations will be involved with the initiative,” said Raju. “We have an institutional arrangement in place. This will give energy to the initiative and make it a regular one. Before the elections, we will hand over a docket to the candidate, which will have all the data of party workers and relevant issues in that seat,” he added.
