Mumbai: The much-publicised membership
drive by the Mumbai Regional Congress Committee (MRCC) has
elicited a lukewarm response with hardly 50,000 new members
being enrolled till December 31, the last day of the exercise,
a senior party official said.
The drive launched by the MRCC on August 30, 2008 had
targeted enrolment of around 2.25 lakh members from areas
under nearly 9000 polling booths in the metropolis, its
spokesman Ajit Sawant told agency.
The party, which is ruling in Maharashtra along with
NCP, has around 6.25 lakh members in the metropolis.
"In spite of the Congress having five Lok Sabha
members from the city, we have been able to enroll hardly
about 50,000 members in more than a year. This reflects poorly
on the organisational capabilities of the local leadership,"
an MRCC official said asking not to be named.
MRCC Spokesman Nizamuddin Raheen, however, refused to
disclose the exact number of the new members, but said the
figure was "quite large".
"I cannot tell you the exact figures right now, but
these are fairly large," he said.
"The membership drive is a continuous process and
there is no restriction on enrolling members after the expiry
of December 31, 2009, deadline. It is a party affair and not a government directive," Raheen said.
Raheen said around 1.70-lakh membership forms had been
distributed and party leaders and active workers were getting
them filled in by those who share the Congress ideology and
programmes.
However, another office-bearer, who too pleaded
anonymity, said it was due to the poor response to the drive
that the party had not published the voters' list which was to
be released on January 15.
PTI
First Published: Saturday, January 30, 2010, 17:16