Back after a 59-day-long sabbatical, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi will be meeting a delegation of farmers on Saturday — a day before the party’s “Kisan-Khet Mazdoor Rally” on Sunday to galvanise protests against the NDA’s land Acquisition Ordinace.
Rahul is meeting the farmers to get their views regarding the changes being brought in the UPA’s land law by the Modi Government.
According to sources, Gandhi — accompanied by some senior party leaders, including Jairam Ramesh and Digvijay Singh — will meet members of various farmer organisations from UP, Haryana, Rajasthan, Punjab and Madhya Pradesh.
The delegation would also include farmers from Bhatta Parsaul village. This is the same village from where Rahul had launched a padayatra in 2011 against forcible land acquisition, a protest that had culminated in passage of Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013.
The meeting was earlier scheduled for Friday but was put off till Saturday, a day before the party’s massive rally.
Rahul will be addressing the rally along with party president Sonia Gandhi.
The rally is being seen as a sort of a comeback announcement of Rahul and a show of strength by the party, which has been strongly opposing changes in the original Act.
A senior AICC functionary said that besides the rally, Rahul will also be speaking in the lok Sabha and is expected to take on the Government after the second part of the Budget Session begins on Monday.
The Congress is hoping to rally people from various parts of the country with the ‘Chalo Dilli Chale’ slogan which will be seen on hoardings and heard on FM radio channels on which it has booked spots. A 17-coach ‘Kisan Express’ train carrying farmers will leave from Jaipur and arrive at Delhi after six stops on the rally day.
AICC general secretary Digvijay Singh, who is convenor of the committee to chalk out plans for organising the rally, deliberated with AICC secretaries to review the preparations for the rally. State leaders have been directed to ensure that the rally has full attendance.
Indicating that a generational change could happen in the party, Digvijay told the secretaries that he, Ahmed Patel and many leaders were made PCC chiefs at very young age of 38 and 33 and “now it is time for the youngsters”.
“It is the era of youth. Time for our retirement has come. It is the nature’s law. Old leaves ripen and then fall. New leaves then come. Youth is the flavour of the season. The leadership of youth will come and lead the country.
“Our success is in the success of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. All party workers are fighting under the leadership of Sonia and Rahul,” Singh said.
Sources in the party maintain that a clarity will soon emerge on decisions, most likely after a meeting of the Congress Working Committee and AICC meeting, where a number of key decisions are to be taken.