Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Jan 14: National president of Congress party, Rahul Gandhi, who has told the state unit of his party in no uncertain terms that they have to ensure that Congress rises to power again in the state in the upcoming assembly election, has told the leaders to pedal soft Hindutva to effectively counter strong Hindutva which has been adopted as poll plank by the BJP.

Rahul has asked the state office bearers to prepare a list of party candidates for the election at the earliest, and to release the list in respect of 150 constituencies where there is no confusion about the candidature, so that the candidates can begin work in their respective constituencies immediately. He has agreed to undertake a three-day tour of the state beginning February 10, and to launch electioneering by his party for assembly election by addressing a mega convention of party workers being convened in the city on February 12.

During the consultations he held at New Delhi on Saturday January 13 with Karnataka chief minister, Siddaramaiah, president of Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC), G Parameshwar, and some other leaders from the state, he is understood to have discussed about strategies to be implemented for the election. He impressed upon the leaders that the paramount aim of all the strategies should be to bring back Congress to power in Karnataka. He also held one-to-one meetings with party leaders, gathered their opinions about the current political scenario in Karnataka, and advised them to get fully involved with election campaigning immediately.

The leaders who accompanied the chief minister during this visit were senior leader, Mallikarjun Kharge, former union minister, Veerappa Moily, Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee working president, S R Patil, and others.

The broad guidelines he has outlined for party's victory in the state are to place before the people failures of Modi government, exercising caution when issuing statements pertaining to Hindutva, pooling of resources for the election, putting social websites to maximum use, giving wide publicity to corruption and other charges faced by BJP leaders, strengthening of law and order mechanism in coastal districts to rein in highhandedness of Hindu outfits and BJP, and creating awareness campaigns at booth level to clear doubts and misgivings the party workers may be having about use of electronic voting machines.

At the same time, Rahul is learnt to have left strict instructions to party leaders to own defensive posture about Hindutva that is the major issue BJP is banking on, desist from issuing controversial statements about Hindutva and not to project themselves as anti-Hindu. With particular reference to the techniques adopted by BJP in Gujarat, he highlighted the failure of leaders of his party in Gujarat and deliberated on mistakes committed by them, it is said. He was of the opinion that the party failed in organizing party workers at booth level in Gujarat, which resulted in the party's downfall there. At the same time, he is understood to have expressed reservations about branding of Hindu outfits as terrorists by chief minister, Siddaramaiah, and KPCC working president, Dinesh Gundu Rao.

He told the leaders in the state to project united image, not to give to rise to confusions, resolve internal differenecs themselves, and find solutions to problems before they appear in the media.