Chandigarh, Oct 11 (IANS) With his party's central government facing several scams, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi Thursday urged youths to come forward to "cleanse and change politics".
"We want you to come to politics, cleanse it and change it," Gandhi, wearing a white kurta and blue jeans, told a well-attended rally of the National Students Union of India (NSUI) at Panjab University campus here.
"I have been in politics for eight years. One thing I see clearly, the level of participation of youths is not there. Whether in jobs, corruption, development, you are the solution. You have to run this country. You have the power and the knowledge to run it," he said.
Gandhi said that the NSUI and the Youth Congress, the student and youth wings of the 127-year-old party, were the only ones to give youths a chance to enter politics.
"Doors of politics were closed for you. We opened them in NSUI and Youth Congress. Today, lakhs of youths, who do not have any relatives in politics, are in our organization. When we talked of elected NSUI and Youth Congress in Punjab, other parties said this cannot be done. We did it and showed to them not only in Punjab but whole of India," he asserted.
He said that when other parties are asked about elections (for youth), they do not reply.
Quoting a diplomat from a European country, Gandhi said that if the 20th century was that of oil as source of energy, the 21st century was that of youth. He said India has enough human resource in its youths.
Referring to Punjab, Gandhi said: "What is happening to human resource in Punjab. Seven out of 10 youths have the problem of drugs."
He claimed that the government in Punjab was not giving unemployment allowance to the young people.
"We send scholarship money for SC, ST (Scheduled Castes/Tribes) categories. It is not utilized here (in Punjab) and is sent back," he said.
Gandhi said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the National Democratic Alliance it leads were opposing the Congress policies without any basis.
"Our government brought FDI. Its meaning is giving the farmer his rightful share. When the BJP and NDA government were in Delhi, they were not opposed to FDI. We did it, they are opposing it. We gave MGNREGA (rural employment scheme) and land acquisition bill, they have opposed it too."
"They want to stop work. Ask them what you want to do, they will not reply. Whatever Congress wants to do, they want to stop. Because they know that if they let us work, we will change this country. But we will not stop. We have the power of the youth and the future," he added.
Earlier, Gandhi met senior Congress leaders at the Punjab state Congress headquarters here to get a feedback on the party's situation in the state.
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Comments:
TJ
October 11, 2012 at 6:02 PM
Ramesh
October 11, 2012 at 5:39 PMHe and his family are greatest bane for our country. They run the Govt. from behind the curtain, and carry out massive graft scam. In the coal gate, it was clearly shown by the CAG that there was loss to exchequer, but the congress shamelessly kept denying it. It is equivalent to say that whatever one can do do we will keep looting the country. Now he talks of cleansing the politics. Blatant liar and scoundrel he is .
chetan
October 11, 2012 at 5:31 PMLook who is talking. A thief.
Anirudh
October 11, 2012 at 5:30 PMSays the person who has not taken a stand on any major issue in recent history except to come out at the last minute to deliver a lame duck speech on the jan lokpal issue. says the man who has never had the guts to actually run for any office. says the baby boy who ran out of the country to cope with the debilitating defeat in 2 states after his campaign ran into the ground. says the person who needs an entire retinue of cabinet ministers to defend his every word
I don't understand why they only care about farmers and not the shop keepers on every street of small cities.
Many shop keepers are not even able to compete retail chains in India, then how will they survive again worlds biggest players.
I guess next time they will have a new agenda of small scale retailer suicides, like they have farmer suicides now.
Instead of promoting small scale business they are just centralizing powers.
This is like damaging economy forever, virtually leading towards an era like before 1947.