Kolkata: In the run-up to the Assembly
elections in West Bengal, Trinamool Congress will take as interns two students of the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta to reach out to the youth in the state.
The IIM-C finalists Hariharan Sriram and Mansha Tandon
wrote to Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee about four
months ago, expressing their eagerness to do the internship
with the party from April 11 to May 13.
"Our decision (for the internship) had to do a lot with
the process of political change with the Trinamool Congress
and Mamata Banerjee at the forefront. We wanted to look at
this change from inside," Sriram said.
A B-Tech from National Institute of Technology, Trichi,
Sriram said he wanted to gain an insight about the working of
the political system, particularly the marketing and
organisational skills of the political parties.
"It is easy to sit in the drawing room and theorize about
political events. We think the internship would give us the
view at the ground," he said.
Before writing to Banerjee, Sriram discussed the matter
with party vice-president Derek O`Brien who delivered a
lecture at the IIM-C in August last year on the theme `Success
Is a Four-Letter Word`.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, IIM-C student Harsh
Vardhan Chhaparia had followed BJP leader L K Advani on his
campaign trail.
Sriram and Tandon, whose areas of study at the IIM-C
included public policy, management and the politics of
development, will intern at the Trinamool Congress `war room`
from April 11 to May 13.
They will join a small team of seasoned politicians and
other professionals at the Trinamool Bhavan, party sources
said.
"We will be working on the youth connect. We will also
try to figure out how to put in place an online system to
connect to people who are cyber literate," Tandon said.
A major in Economics and French from the University of
New South Wales, Australia, Tandon said her decision to intern
with the Trinamool Congress was because she felt "very
divorced" from Indian polity.
When contacted, party vice-president Derek O`Brien said
he was not surprised that people from all walks of life were
attracted to the vision of party chief Mamata Banerjee.
"It is not surprising at all that more people from the
grassroots to the boardroom are getting attracted to Mamata`s
vision of `Ma-Mati-Manush`," he said.
Six-phased Assembly polls in West Bengal will be held on
April 18, 23, 27, May 3, 7 and 10.
PTI
