subject: Congress General Secretary ¬Rahul Gandhi's Speech at AICC Plenary session [print this page] Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi's Speech at AICC Plenary session
Human resource is the fuel of the 21st Century. Connectivity is the catalyst that links this fuel to the engine of progress. We are a nation of over one hundred crore people. It is interesting that for decades of our existence we have considered the vastness of this resource to be a hindrance to our progress. The reason for this has been our own inability to connect the fuel of our human resource to the engine of progress. A population unconnected to the growth engine of our economy is a wasted and unproductive resource. The participation of its people drives the strength of a democracy. Connecting the individual aam aadmi and aam yuva to our political system is the first step in our journey towards empowering the individual. India's talent is as deep as the ocean. Like the ocean, it has no boundaries. It is neither rich nor poor. It is not divided along the lines of religion, caste or region. It is Indian. Until we rise above our differences and break these artifical barriers we will not be able to unleash India's full potential. Seeing it as anything but India's resource is destructive. Seeing it through any lens other than the lens of opportunity is shortsighted. There is only one political organisation in this country
that can reach out to each and every Indian. That is the organisation built by Mahatma Gandhi. That is the Congress Party.
Just as a strong democracy is built on the foundations of an open, inclusive and participatory political system, we must recognize that the strength of an economic system lies in unlocking the potential of each individual. In today's globalised world, a closed economy will never provide each Indian with an opportunity. An open and connected economic system is the only means of delivering opportunity to each Indian. Earlier, I mentioned connectivity. What did I mean by this? In the 1960's and 70's the Green Revolution ensured food productivity in India through the opening of our agricultural system. By increasing productivity we generated surpluses thus connecting our farmer to the market. By nationalizing the banks, we connected the rural poor to the banking system and enabled them to access loans. In the 1980's, the STD PCO booth opened up our communication system, and for the first time, the people in our villages were able to talk to their relatives in our cities. Through the 1990's this process of connecting the poor and opening up continued and deepened and it is as a result of this that we are today growing at close to 9% and are the world's second fastest growing economy.
This sustained growth has empowered the Congress government to take development to the individual through the concept of rights. Individual rights give people the space to realize their full potential. Mahatma Gandhi NREGA has given our people the right to employment for 100 days each year. RTI gives every Indian the right to question their Government. The Right to Education Act gives every Indian child the hope of a bright future. The Forest Rights Act has
given our adivasi brothers and sisters the right to the forests which they inhabit.
The proposed Food Security Bill embodies our pledge to end the hunger and malnutrition of our people. And soon Aadhaar, the Unique ID initiative will give
1.1 billion Indians the right to an individual identity or a Pehchaan. This will allow us to identify the aam aadmi and make our delivery system more accountable. Our loan waiver reopened the doors of our banks to our farmers who were burdened with debt. We have linked womens' self help groups to banks and ended their financial apartheid. None of this would have been possible without rapid economic growth. We must never forget that there is a relationship between growth and the distribution of opportunity. The challenge of the 21st Century is to strike the correct balance. This is what we refer to as inclusive growth.
I would like to thank the Congress President Soniaji and our respected Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singhji who have demonstrated the wisdom and ability to strike and maintain this balance. Connecting our people with opportunity is our political imperative. If there is one thing that determines opportunity, it is education. Today, one of the greatest challenges before us is to make education accessible to the poorest of the poor.
Our schools and universities need to work as a network connected to jobs, research and development and the society at large. This opening up will form the education backbone of our country. Equally, our infrastructure, both physical and technological, must connect people to one another, our hinterland to our cities and our villages to the world. This connectivity will truly provide our people with freedom of thought, of aspiration and of movement. It will give them the
ability to compete not merely with one another but with the rest of the world. Nobody, the world over, can challenge our spirit of enterprise. However, for opportunity and connectivity to transform our nation we require accountability and transparency. Corruption is the symptom of closed and opaque economic and political structures.
An academic came to see me recently. He is writing a book on the aam aadmi. He was struggling to define the aam aadmi and asked me for my definition. I thought about it. And here is my answer. The aam aadmi in India is that person who does not have a connection to the system. Whether he is poor or rich, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or Christian, educated or uneducated, if he is not connected to the system, he is an aam aadmi.
1He is the tribal boy in Niyamgiri who is thrown off his land without justice
2The Dalit boy in Jhansi who is forced to sit at the back of the class room
She is the young professional in Bangalore who can't get her child into a good school 3
4He is the university topper in Shillong who cannot get a job because he doesn't know the right people
5He is the farmer in Aligarh who does not get the price he deserves for his land
He is the businessman in Hyderabad who is pushed aside because he does not have connections 6
She is the widow in Vidarbha, beset with tragedy in her family, struggling to make both ends meet 7
He is the bureaucrat whose professional future is at risk because he refuses to compromise 8
9He is the worker who builds the metro with his blood and sweat but will never get the credit for it
10He is the poor carpenter from Basti living in the slums of Mumbai who did not get an education because of the lack of opportunity
We call him the common man but in fact he is unique. He has immense capabilities, intelligence and strength. He builds this country every day of his life and yet our system crushes him at every step. I am a young politician and I have a lot to learn. But there is one thing that I am certain of. We will never build a nation until we start recognising and respecting the common man. We will never build a nation until we build a system in which this man's progress is based not on who he knows but on what he knows. This is the challenge of our generation.
