Leading the change

At the launch of India’s first crowd sourced manifesto, young participants suggested some crucial measures

August 30, 2013 06:12 pm | Updated 06:17 pm IST - NEW DELHI

Pressing for ‘change’ in the political system of the country, the young members of our society gathered for a campaign of India’s first crowd sourced manifesto called ‘My Space – My Unmanifesto’ at Vishwa Yuvak Kendra organised by The Youth Collective, Pravah, Youth Ki Awaaz, Gandhi Fellowship and Purple Mangoes among others.

The event, which saw a gathering of more than 400 young participants, started with a brain writing session wherein young people made new promises on a kite and passed it around. Others added comments and suggestions to that promise. About 300 promises were collected with this activity.

The objective of the campaign is to encourage young people to participate in politics and to build a long term engagement between the two.

Parliamentarians like Manvendra Singh and Meenakshi Natarajan were part of a panel discussion and were felicitated by Amitabh Behar, ED, National Foundation of India. Ten wishes ranging from legislating and enforcing a strong Lokpal Bill to mandating 35 per cent reservation of the youth in legislative assemblies and cabinet equivalent bodies along with 33 per cent reservation for women were presented to them by various groups like Delhi slum community youth, sex workers and eunuchs, urban college youth and also community youth in MP and Rajasthan. The participating organisations wanted these wishes to be in the manifesto of the respective political parties of the panellists.

Manvinder Singh remarked, “Employment is the biggest issue facing youth according to my understanding and I am glad it has come right at the top of your manifesto too.”

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.