Sam Pitroda: 'Congress needs Gandhian approach of public service'

The Congress needs to take the “Gandhian approach” of public service and get 5,000 workers in every district dedicated to the cause of helping people to get its mojo back, technocrat-turned-politician Sam Pitroda said on Wednesday. Pitroda said that all Congress leaders must spend six months studying the Father of the Nation on his 150th birth anniversary to be ideologically equipped. Sam Pitroda, a long-time advisor of the Gandhi family and head of the Indian Overseas Congress, said that the country is facing a “major conflict” for the idea of India.

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The Congress needs to keep talking about this ideological battle and take its message to the people, the 77-year-old told PTI over the phone from Chicago.

“We are perhaps not doing enough of that. We need to educate our young. Need to learn Gandhi. Understand the real history of India and not through sound bites and WhatsApp,” he said, adding that all young leaders coming into the Congress need to read about the father of the nation.

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He said that the challenge for the party is to rebuild its cadre and have about 5,000 Congress workers in every district. “Everybody wants to work in Delhi, nobody wants to work in the districts, everybody wants a ticket. We need to take the Gandhian approach of service (to people),” Mr. Pitroda said. Politics is not a career, it is service to the people, he said, hitting out at leaders who switch parties in the belief it would be better for their careers.

“Until we get 5,000-10,000 people in every district who are dedicated to help local people you don’t have a movement. That is what we need,” Mr. Pitroda said.

Asked what is the way forward for the Congress, Mr. Pitroda said that the party needs to “do a lot more demonstrations” against the government’s policies. He also lamented that the media is such that the party’s message doesn’t get heard. “India is for everybody and that idea is being damaged, that is the fundamental issue,” he said.

“If I cannot build an India based on freedom, human rights, inclusion, diversity, and if somebody tries to build an India opposite to this, I must fight,” Pitroda said.

'People need to go back to Gandhian principles'

Pitroda asserted that Gandhi’s message is very important for the world in the prevailing circumstances and is the only way for coming out of the “crisis” prevailing around the globe with democracy being undermined in several regions. People, he said, need to go back to Gandhian principles which are very fundamental — truth, trust, love, simplicity, inclusion, diversity, and non-violence. Pitroda also hit out at the Modi government, alleging that the current dispensation’s style of functioning is opposite to the Gandhi principles.

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