Rahul to hold consultations on manifesto in Feb

Congress president Rahul Gandhi is all set to interact with a cross-section of the society to seek their inputs for the party's manifesto for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

Congress managers are planning to hold at least four such interactions one each in southern, northern, eastern and western regions of the country.

Members of the AICC Manifesto Committee, chaired by former finance minister P Chidambaram, have already held more than 100 consultations with farmers, businessmen, students, ex-servicemen, women, intellectuals, teachers among other groups across almost every state.

“We are planning to have Congress president's interactions sometime in February,” an AICC functionary associated with the consultations exercise said.

Former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan has also given suggestions on how to revive the country's economy and the party may also consider them, a Congress leader said.

However, he made it clear that the suggestions were not made by Rajan exclusively to the Congress, but were posted on his website for the benefit of everyone.

The party intends to hold around 150 consultations at a total of 60 locations across the country before it comes out with its manifesto for general elections, the leader said.

He said the party has already received over 10,000 responses from public online, giving suggestions on a host of issues, which the party may include in the document.

Except for Rahul's outreach programme, the exercise of consultations for the manifesto is expected to be completed by February 1.

The party manifesto will be released closer to the Lok Sabha elections and is expected to include a blueprint for an alternative to the BJP’s much-touted Gujarat model of development.

Chidambaram has held consultations in Mumbai, Bengaluru and was in Varanasi recently to meet intellectuals and people from different sections of society.

“The response in Varanasi was overwhelming. The discussions lasted for two hours and could have gone on for another two hours,” an AICC functionary said.

In November, Chidambaram had discussed the economic situation with representatives of the CII and FICCI and sought their inputs for the manifesto.