Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday, in a message meant to enthuse the workers of the party, said the first change he wants to bring about in the organisation is to break the walls that exist between them and the leadership, and give them preference while distributing tickets to contest elections.
“Some of you may not like it. But we will have to change the organisation. There are workers sitting at the back. They have the energy to change the country. But there is a wall between them and the leaders. My first task is to break that wall,” Rahul said in his concluding speech at the AICC plenary.
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As the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium, the venue of the plenary, reverberated with thunderous applause from the workers, Rahul went on to say, “This wall has different manifestations. One is parachuting candidates. The worker toils for 10-15 years and gives his blood and sweat for the party, but he is told, 'No, you are a worker. You have no money. So you will not get the ticket'...The worker has the Congress ideology in his heart. You will get the ticket.'”
Rahul said a small example of this change was showcased in Gujarat, where workers were given tickets. “The result was that you saw; Modiji flying in a sea plane,” he said.
“The day the worker is empowered, forget the sea plane, Modiji will be seen in a submarine,” he added.
Pointing to the bare stage at the session, which was a big difference from the earlier Congress sessions in which senior leaders, including the Congress president, would be seated on gaddas placed on the stage and the delegates would be given place among the audience below, Rahul said he had emptied it for the youth of the country.
“This stage, I will fill it with the youth. I will drag the talented people here,” he said, soon adding in an effort to assuage the concerns of the senior leaders in the party, “Of course, the senior leaders have their place in the party, and the youth have their place.”
Rahul admitted that the party suffered in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections because it did not live up to the expectations of the people.
“Every single state in this country has a list of our workers who have died for this country. The soil of this nation is stained with the blood of our men and women.... But in the last few years of our last government, and I don't say this with happiness, we did not stand up to the expectations of the people of the country. The people of this country were let down by us,” he said.