Congress workers to interact with Rahul via ‘Shakti’

JAIPUR: The Congress on Thursday launched a mobile phone-based pilot project to establish a direct link between its workers and supporters with the party’s central leadership. The project, christened as “Shakti”, is aimed at knowing the Congress workers, their ideas and views and in gathering feedback directly from the grassroots level.
Launching the pilot project in poll-bound Rajasthan, AICC general secretary Avinash Pande said, “Congress workers are present in every village, locality and street of the country. If complete information about them is brought together at one platform, this big ‘Shakti’ (strength) can be utilised in nation building and in strengthening the party.”

Pande said the project was a brainchild of Congress president Rahul Gandhi, who would be directly interacting with the party workers who get enrolled with the “Shakti”. “Rahul ji has always emphasised on recognising and strengthening the party workers,” said Pande.

The party has released a mobile number (7045003900) on which Congress workers and supporters would be required to send a text message from their personal mobile-phones, giving their voter card identity numbers. The message senders would be scrutinised at two levels before being enrolled with the project. At the first level, the sender’s voter id number, name, address and other details would be verified. At the second level, the sender’s antecedents would be verified by the party’s state team to ensure that the person is a genuine Congressman or a believer in Congress ideology.

“It will be a screened and filtered data about Congress workers and supporters,” said Sachin Pilot, the party state president. He claimed that project “Shakti” was different from BJP’s programme that enrolls members simply through making missed phone calls. “Ours is a two-way communication initiative with genuine party workers and supporters. People will not only be enrolled after proper verification but they would also be able to directly communicate with our leadership by sending their views and ideas,” Pilot said at a press conference.

The last date for enrolling with the project in the state is March 31.