MP polls: Congress to release manifesto in three phases

Bhopal: In an interesting move, Congress on Wednesday dropped hints that the election manifesto of the party for Madhya Pradesh, which is going to Assembly polls by end of the year, would be released in three phases.

A spokesman of the party told this newspaper that the move was aimed at denying ruling BJP to take advantage of the proposed early declaration of election manifesto by Congress.

“The election manifesto committee of MP Congress has almost finalised the poll manifesto. The party is ready to declare the poll manifesto by second week of September. However, we are worried that the ruling BJP may do ‘copy, paste’ job to steal our agenda and then add some additional agenda to make their election manifesto more lucrative before the electorates. Hence, we have decided to release the manifesto in three phases at different periods before the forthcoming Assembly elections in the state, due in November-December this year,” the spokesman said.

Sources said the party may declare the first part of election manifesto by September 17 when AICC president Rahul Gandhi is scheduled to visit Bhopal to sound poll bugle for the party in MP.

The first part of election manifesto would focus on unemployed youths and farmers in the state.

Similarly, the two other parts of the manifesto would be declared at “appropriate” time by including local issues, sources said.