On occasion of Gandhi Jayanti, Rahul to spell out party's future strategy at Maharashtra's Wardha

Rahul Gandhi will attend a prayer meeting at Bapu Kutir in the ashram before presiding over the CWC.

New Delhi: Congress president Rahul Gandhi will on Tuesday preside over the party's working committee meeting at the Sevagram ashram of Mahatma Gandhi in Maharashtra's Wardha district. He will lead a foot march on the occasion of the Father of the Nation's 150th birth anniversary.

The Congress chief will attend a prayer meeting at Bapu Kutir in the ashram Tuesday morning before presiding over the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting.

He will participate in a foot-march in Wardha in the afternoon, a party leader said Monday, adding the Congress president will also address a public meeting on Tuesday evening.

Addressing a press conference at Sevagram near Wardha, Congress' chief spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said Rahul Gandhi will lead the 'padyatra' after garlanding the statue of Mahatma Gandhi near the Collector's Office in Wardha.

"The padyatra will culminate in a 'SankalpRally' at the Circus ground where he is expected to spell out the party's future strategy and pledge to uphold Gandhian principles and ideology," he said.

Describing Tuesday's CWC meeting "historic", Surjewala said, the Congress Working Committee had in 1942 met in Sevagram under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi to adopt the 'Quit India' resolution and a meeting was again held there in March 1948.

"There is a historical linkage to the CWC meeting scheduled tomorrow, as (Mahatma) Gandhi's ideology is under attack and being encroached upon in current times," the Congress leader said.

He claimed that the situation prevailing in the country is of "loot, jhoot (lies), 'batware' (division) and 'bhay' (fear)", from which the country needs freedom.

"Mahatma Gandhi lives in the heart and soul of every Indian. The need of the hour is to pledge to uphold his principles of equality, social justice, eradicating discrimination, ending the menace of communalism, casteism and regionalism," he said.

In a veiled attack against the Modi government, Surjewala said those in power are merely doing a "lip service" to the Gandhian thought "after murdering it".

"They swear by Mahatma Gandhi only for optics and photo-ops. Just by speaking about the Mahatma and releasing one's photos (modelled on) like Gandhi, doesn't make anybody a Gandhian," he said in a veiled reference to the rome minister's 'Swacch Bharat' scheme.

Surjewala also said the Congress' fight is against "falsehood, violence and fear".

"The Congress is fighting a war against the ideology of (Nathuram) Godse (the assassin of the Mahatma)," he said.

In April 1936, Mahatma Gandhi established his residence in the village Shegaon near Wardha which he renamed as Sevagram, which means 'village of service'.