Stressing the need for expanding his party’s reach and consolidating its forces ahead of the 2023 Assembly elections, Sridhar Babu, All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary and in charge of the Kalyana Karnataka region, said his main focus would be building party structures at grassroots level.
“We will build and consolidate party structures at booth, village, taluk, and district levels. I am here not for a particular leader or group in the party but for all party leaders and cadres. Our objective is to strengthen the Congress and ensure that it will win the maximum number of seats in the region,” Mr. Babu said at a media conference in Kalaburagi party office on Saturday.
When asked whether he had any plans to approach the leaders who had quit Congress in the last Assembly and Lok Sabha elections and try to bring them back to the party fold, Mr. Babu said that he would definitely do it if the local party units and Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee would feel the necessity.
Mr. Babu also appealed to the people to participate in the massive rally that the Congress would organise in Bengaluru on August 15 to celebrate 75th Independence Day.
“To commemorate 75th anniversary of India’s independence and hail the heroic struggle and sacrifice of freedom fighters, we are going to hold a massive rally in Bengaluru. Over 3 lakh people are expected to participate in it. Over 15 non-Congress people have already registered online,” Mr. Babu said.
In an attempt to expose the hollowness of the BJP’s patriotism, Mr. Babu said that Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the mother organisation of the BJP, refused to hoist the national flag at its headquarters in Nagpur for over five decades.
“The BJP and other right-wing organisations are claiming these days that they are the real patriots. They are calling people to hoist the national flag on their houses ahead of the Independence Day. But one should always remember that the RSS had refused to hoist the national flag on its headquarter for over five decades. None of its members participated in India’s freedom movement. It was the Congress that led the freedom movement and sacrificed for it,” he said.
Pradesh Congress Committee working president Eshwar Khandre, vice-president Sharan Prakash Patil, spokesperson Priyank Kharge, MLA Khaneez Fatima, the former Deputy Chairman of the Karnataka Legislative Council B.R. Patil and other party leaders were present.
