New Delhi: The Congress leaders on Wednesday described Rahul Gandhi’s five guarantees for women voters as a 'game changer' in the coming Lok Sabha polls and said that a concerted campaign will be launched to publicise the various promises across the country.
The five guarantees for women came days after Rahul made promises for youth including filling up of 30 lakh vacant central government jobs and legal MSP for the farmers as part of his social justice campaign.
The promise for women includes Rs 1 lakh per year for poor families, half of all new central government jobs for women, doubling of central government’s contribution to Asha, Anganwadi and Mid-day meal scheme workers, legal assistance at Panchayat level, doubling the number of hostels for working women and ensuring that each district had at least one.
According to government estimates, there are over 10 lakh Asha workers, around 26 lakh Anganwadi workers and lakhs of mid-day meal workers across the country.
“This policy is going to be a game changer in the coming Lok Sabha elections. So far, we used to hear only talk about empowering women. But now these five guarantees will give full rights to half the electorate which means around 50 crore women voters across the country,” AICC functionary Rajani Patil told ETV Bharat.
“We are already publicising the various Nyay guarantees among the people and special campaigns will be organized to take the message to the women voters over the coming days,” she said. According to party insiders, the five guarantees for women were a nationwide extension and expansion of the women allowance schemes that the Congress is already implementing in party ruled Karnataka, Telangana and Himachal Pradesh.
Similar allowances were given by the previous party governments in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh over the past five years. In the 2022 UP assembly elections, party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had announced a campaign to focus on the women voters but the plan did not click on the ground, said party insiders.
“This time the five guarantees for women have been well thought through. The financial support that will be needed to implement the policy has also been worked out. We are not like the BJP which just makes promises to win votes and then forgets them. We have done our homework properly,” AICC secretary in charge of Uttarakhand Deepika Pandey Singh told ETV Bharat.
Both Patil and Singh said that “there had been an old demand from the Asha, Anganwadi and mid-day meal scheme workers in the rural areas that their remuneration may be increased.” “The Jharkhand government had increased its share in the remuneration to these women workers but not the central government,” said Singh, a Jharkhand MLA.
According to the AICC functionary, the five guarantees for women were targeted at a cross-section of women including the poor in the rural areas, the semi-skilled women and those living in the urban areas.
“The promise to provide legal assistance to women at the Panchayat level will have a major impact. I recently got a call from a distressed woman who needed police assistance but did not know that there was a police station three km away from her place. If such women can get legal help in their village, it will be a big relief for them,” said Singh.
“Hostel for working women will provide a big support to females in the urban areas while honorarium for poor women will give them around Rs 8,500 per month and will be a big relief,” said Patil.
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