Congress asks ministers to reach out to UP voters

Pre-poll surveys in Uttar Pradesh have been troubling the Congress, whose tally of seats would tumble to single digits without timely intervention.

Aware of the need to galvanise voters, the party has asked six of its ministers from UP to visit 12 districts each beyond the limits of their constituencies to listen to people’s grievances and coordinate with the state and central governments to remedy them.

AICC General Secretary Madhusudan Mistry, in charge of party affairs in Uttar Pradesh, said Union Ministers Salman Khurshid, Beni Prasad Verma, Pradeep Jain, Jitin Prasad, R P N Singh and Sriprakash Jaiswal are trusted with the task.

Mistry, widely credited with the party’s spectacular victory in Karnataka, has said that he received complaints from Uttar Pradesh about the Samajwadi Party-led government’s “faulty” implementation of welfare schemes.

Despite propping-up the UPA government at the Centre, SP remains a rival to Congress in state politics.

Disenchantment among voters was clear when Amethi witnessed protest during Rahul Gandhi and sister Priyanka Vadra’s visit earlier this week.

The view prevailing in AICC is that the party cannot expect better result when it has no link with the UP voters.

A Congress leader said voters are willing to vote for Congress, but the party has no workers to engage them.

The ministers have been asked to present a report each month on their visits to Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice president Rahul.

“We expect the ministers to visit two districts every month. This would mean that they would have covered the entire state within six months, in time for the Lok Sabha elections next year,” a Congress leader said.

There is anger against the Congress in the state, especially as its ministers were found wanting in reaching out to people beyond their respective constituencies.

The opposition BJP has made master strategist Amit Shah as party in-charge in UP to capitalise on the disenchantment against the regional parties and  the Congress.

Shah is close aid of Narendra Modi, BJP’s presumptive Prime Ministerial candidate in 2014 Lok Sabha elections.