The meeting was chaired by TNCC president K. Selvaperunthagai in the Satyamurthy Bhavan in Chennai.
A meeting of the Tamil Nadu Congress Committee (TNCC) on Thursday called upon its party cadre to work for the victory in the local body elections and the 2026 Assembly poll and eventually to “increase the representation of the Congress party”. The INDIA bloc led by DMK in Tamil Nadu secured a massive victory in 2024 Lok Sabha polls and continued to enjoy the people’s support, it said.
“In Tamil Nadu politics, our future could be bright only by expanding the vote bank of the Congress. For this, we should begin our primary task of strengthening the Congress party at the booth level. Our primary motive is to create an impression in Tamil Nadu politics that the Congress party is strong,” one of the resolutions adopted in the meeting of the TNCC said.
Underlining the need for drafting its “future plan”, the meeting recalled efforts of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi during 1987-89 to bring back the ‘Kamarajar government’ in Tamil Nadu. In the 1989 Assembly election, it secured 20% of the votes and 26 Assembly seats. The meeting was chaired by TNCC president K. Selvaperunthagai in the Satyamurthy Bhavan in Chennai.
“In line with the dream of late leader Rajiv Gandhi, our objective should be to form a Kamarajar government again. But, we should prepare and strengthen ourselves to take steps whenever such an opportunity arises,” it said.
The resolution further read: “This meeting underlines that our objective should be such that even if not today, the dream of forming the Kamarajar government would be fulfilled one day. This meeting resolves to stand by all the steps to be taken by TNCC president K. Selvaperunthagai in drafting an action plan in this regard.”
Condemning the personal attacks against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi by the BJP, the TNCC meeting resolved to prepare itself to face more such attacks. It condemned the BJP over a recent incident in Coimbatore in which a businessman, who questioned Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman over GST was reportedly forced to apologise to her.
The meeting also condemned the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the alleged boycott of Tamil Nadu in the Union Budget for 2024-25. It considered that forcing Tamil Nadu to adopt the National Education Policy was an attempt to destroy the principles of federalism. It accused the BJP government and Ms. Sitharaman of “deceiving” Tamil Nadu in financial allocations.
The TNCC reiterated the national leadership’s positions opposing the ‘One Nation, One Election’ idea and the demand for conducting caste census. It insisted that ‘Education’ should be transferred back to the State from the concurrent list in the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution.
Congress General Secretary in charge of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry Ajoy Kumar, AICC Secretary for Tamil Nadu and Puducherry Suraj M.N. Hegde, legislative party leader S. Rajesh Kumar were among those who took part in the meeting.
One of the resolutions empowered the TNCC president to undertake reforms in the party’s State unit in line with the resolution adopted during the ‘Chintan Shivir’ held in Rajasthan in May 2022 and the Udaipur declaration. It further empowered the TNCC president to reappoint district-level functionaries with the approval of the AICC.
The meeting also adopted a resolution for organising rallies in the local and district levels on the Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary on October 2 to spread the party’s principles and action plan.
Published – September 19, 2024 05:51 pm IST