Rahul asks UP Congress leaders to travel more, be visible

LUCKNOW: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Monday advised the party's UP unit to get more "aggressive" in its preparations for the Lok Sabha elections. Reviewing the performance of the state unit in New Delhi on Monday, Rahul said Union ministers from UP and state level leaders need to be more visible not only at the state headquarters but also in every district.

Instructions have also been issued to leaders to tour not only their respective constituencies more frequently, but also to travel across the state in order to create mass support for the party. At present, UP has six serving Union ministers -- RPN Singh, Beni Prasad Verma, Sriprakash Jaiswal, Jitin Prasada, Salman Khurshid and Pradeep Jain.

While party leaders have been asked to get more active, meeting did not yield any decision on whether Rahul will tour UP against during November. Rahul also instructed general secretary in charge of the state, Madhusudan Mistry, to plan and oversee the planned activities. Sources in the party termed the meeting as "routine" and added that Rahul only took stock of the UP unit's planned activities over the next few months.

Besides party president Nirmal Khatri and CLP leader Pradeep Mathur, AICC general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi, political secretary to Sonia Gandhi Ahmed Patel, general secretary in charge Mistry and the four AICC secretaries in charge of UP were present.

Among the propaganda activities planned by the Congress during November and December, state-level leaders will run campaigns in each of the 80 parliamentary seats in UP, not only to pressurise the UP government into implementing the Food Security Act, but also to corner them on the numerous issues where it has failed to perform.

On November 21, the party plans to launch an offensive against the UP government for deliberately procrastinating over the implementation of the Food Security Act. Senior leaders, led by UPCC president Nirmal Khatri, will stage a sit-in outside the UP chief minister's residence.

The Congress will also take on Narendra Modi and the BJP in UP, stepping up its attack against the "communal forces" and how they are indulging in "divisive politics". Among other local concerns, the party will agitate on behalf of aggrieved cane farmers in Saharanpur, Morabadbad and Meerut whose long-standing demand for payment of outstanding dues has still not been met by the state government.