Expecting to do an encore of the rural job scheme at the forthcoming Lok Sabah polls, with the new food security scheme, the Congress president Sonia Gandhi has called a meeting of party chief ministers on July 13 to discuss the strategy to roll out the scheme. Delhi, where assembly polls are due by the year-end, will be the first state to roll out the scheme on August 20, the birth anniversary of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. Chief minister Sheila Dikshit had meeting with Gandhi Tuesday.
At the Saturday meeting, 34 party leaders, including chief ministers of 14 Congress-ruled states, AICC general secretaries and members of Congress core group, have been invited. Prime minister Manmohan Singh, party vice president Rahul Gandhi and food minister K V Thomas will be present during the delieberations. The idea is to ensure that the scheme is implemented in the best possible manner with Congress-ruled states becoming role models in implementation of the food security measure.
The meeting has been called days after the government rushed through an ordinance on the key measure, which is an indication that the party is keen to pull out all the stops in propagating the food security scheme that will provide right to cheap foodgrain to 82 crore people. The direct benefit transfer scheme and the food security bill are being considered as major moves by Congress ahead of the 2014 general elections as was the farmers' loan waiver scheme and MNREGA announced in UPA-I.
The loan waiver and MNREGA schemes were credited among other things for return of UPA to power in 2009. Several states, including Congress-ruled Karnataka, BJP-governed Chhattigarh, SP-ruled Uttar Pradesh and JD-U-run Bihar, could see early roll out of the programme. Partymen wanted early roll out the scheme so that the scheme is well in place by the time Lok Sabha elections take place.
