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Journalism of Courage
Launching its pre-poll campaign in Meghalaya, the Congress on Thursday announced five commitments, including Rs 3,000 a month to single mothers below the poverty line (BPL), and a job for each household, if voted to power in the February 27 Assembly elections.
While the party is expected to launch its manifesto later this week, the leaders described the five commitments as a “pre-poll campaign” to make Meghalaya a “5 Star state” that would ensure “prosperity reaches every household in Meghalaya”.
The campaign was launched at the party office in Shillong, in the presence of state unit president Vincent Pala and All India Congress Committee general secretary in-charge of Meghalaya, Manish Chatrath. Apart from benefits to women and employment opportunities for the youth, it promises a “corruption free” and “drug-free” Meghalaya.
Highlighting the state’s erratic power supply and its effect on business and education, the party also promised to provide uninterrupted electricity supply to commercial and domestic users, and bring in a law that would make it mandatory for the government to upload all files related to development and infrastructure on government portals. “Long power cuts have affected the production and revenue of entrepreneurs in the state, and had a negative impact on learning and growth of kids who fail to study in the dark due to power cuts,” the party said in a statement.
Pala said financial aid to single mothers is the most important of the five commitments. “Rs 3,000 a month translates to Rs 36,000 a year, which is a substantial amount. This will help women pay the school fees of their children, and tame inflation,” he said, addressing the press conference. “Lack of decent employment opportunities in the state has fuelled desperation among youngsters, who are compelled to migrate to far-flung cities of New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, etc., to meet their basic needs,” added Pala.
The party also criticised the current National People’s Party (NPP)-BJP regime, saying they “did nothing constructive to channelise youth energy in the right direction”. The Congress’s commitment to making Meghalaya drug-free, includes strict action against drug peddlers and opening of “50 new de-addiction centres statewide”.
Chatrath asserted that Congress is also committed to making Meghalaya a corruption-free state. He said they are coming up with a transparency law that would be the “mother of RTI”, which, according to the Congress, has been “diluted step-by-step by the BJP at the Centre and the NPP in the state”.
The Congress, which was the single largest party in the 2018 elections with 21 MLAs, is now left with no sitting legislator, after a dramatic overnight exodus of the MLAs to the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) in November 2021. The events have forced the beleaguered Congress to field mostly first-timers as candidates in the forthcoming polls.
