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Congress plans to rally youth against BJP on issue of right to jobs ahead of 2024 polls

Plans to take this up in Congress-led states first

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Right to jobs could be taken up by the Congress as a major component of its action plan over the next two years to win over youth in the run up to the Lok Sabha elections in 2024. This could first be implemented in the two Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.

A proposal for making right to jobs a major part of the party’s outreach to the youth, who are believed to have moved away from the Congress and supported the BJP in a big way in the Lok Sabha elections in 2019, has been made at the Nav Sankalp Shivir of the Congress being held in Udaipur.

A group formed to discuss issues related to topics relevant to youth such as education and employment has, in its preliminary discussions, shortlisted unemployment as the biggest issue pertaining to the youth, and intends to propose that the party should run an agitation on this issue.

“As many as 30 lakh positions are vacant in the central government. In the states of Uttarakhand, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, the youth are waiting for a chance to join the armed forces, but over 2.55 lakh posts are vacant in the army,” said panel member Alka Lamba.

She said just as the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government had brought in rights-based initiatives for education, food and information, the party should now campaign for a right to job.

Asked if right to job should be first implemented in the states where the Congress in power, she said over the next two years, the governments in the two Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh should take the lead in this regard, and a demand for the same can then be taken up in other states.

Amongst the other proposals of the panel is reserving 50 per cent of the posts in the party, from the block level to the Congress Working Committee, for leaders who are below 50 years of age.

A major point of discussion for the panel is finding out the reasons why the youth are not connecting with the Congress and to make efforts to bring them on board.

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