Guwahati: Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Saturday launched the aam aadmi ka sipahi programme for Assam and other north-eastern States. The programme is aimed at training members of the Youth Congress and the National Students’ Union of India on educating people about the Right To Information Act and various flagship programmes of the Congress-led UPA government.
The Amethi MP, who was on a day’s visit to Assam, urged over 6,000 Youth Congress and NSUI members, who were selected a am aadmi ka sipahi at a training programme at the Sarusajai Stadium here, to educate rural masses about the RTI Act, the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and other programmes so that the empowered masses could ensure that money pumped in by the Central government to the region reached them.
Addressing a meeting at the Rajiv Bhavan (the PCC headquarters) Mr. Gandhi spoke about the efforts to democratise the Youth Congress and listed the success achieved in Punjab and Uttarakhand. Sophisticated methods like introduction of photo identity cards were used to weed out bogus members from the organisation and about 3.5 lakh members were enrolled and elections were held to elect leaders at the block, district and State levels. Similar efforts were made in Uttarakhand, which, he said, yielded good results in strengthening the organisation.
Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi suggested that the democratisation efforts initiated by Mr. Gandhi be adopted in Assam for strengthening the Congress in the State. But, Mr. Gandhi clarified that his jurisdiction was limited to the Youth Congress and the NSUI.
Later, Mr. Gandhi interacted with students at the Don Bosco Institute at Kharghuli here.
