At ‘swaraj’ workshop,candidates get tips on governance

“The meeting primarily talked about how participatory democracy can be brought about in Delhi — by holding meetings in constituencies and conducting mohalla sabhas,” Saurabh Bhardwaj,AAP MLA from Greater Kailash,said.

Called ‘swaraj’,the workshop,which began at 10 am and went on till 6 pm,was conducted by the top leadership of the party — Kejriwal,Yogendra Yadav,Manish Sisodia and Gopal Rai.

“The main thrust of the workshop was to clear doubts about the concept of swaraj and how it will be implemented from below. This is primarily drawn from Mahatma Gandhi’s concept of gram sabhas,” Harish Khanna,AAP MLA from Timarpur who attended the session,said.

According to AAP MLAs,the significance of the training session should be seen with regard to the changes in governance proposed by the party. “For the first time in the history of this country,a mechanism is being proposed to bring people into governance. The concept of swaraj is based on direct participation of people in a democracy. In this context,a discussion of these ideas was imperative,” Khanna said.

Senior party leaders said the aim of the workshop was to define the nature of work to be undertaken at the locality level. “Matters relating to the constituency manifestoes and the top 18 points of our main agenda were also discussed,” AAP leader Sanjay Singh said.

Singh said books on swaraj were distributed in the workshop. “They were asked to be in touch with people through door-to-door campaigns and jan sabhas,” he said.