Jignesh Mevani , who has been elected to the Gujarat Assembly in the recent elections, has said he has plans to launch a national-level platform involving young leaders of people’s movements, including Kanhaiya Kumar and Shehla Rashid, to defeat the BJP.
In an interview to The Hindu , Mr. Mevani said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has become “boring and is left with no content”.
He would, Mr. Mevani said, like to be part of a forum involving Ms. Rashid; Mr. Kanhaiya Kumar; Alpesh Thakor, leader of the Backward Classes with the Congress; Hardik Patel, who led the Patidar movement in Gujarat; students from the Film and Television Institute of India and Jadavpur University; and student leaders who stand for Dalit-Muslim unity, unity of workers, and peasants.
Mr. Mevani said he will visit Delhi in the second week of January and hold talks with Mr. Kanhaiya Kumar and other youth leaders. Besides, he would also be meeting top political leaders, including Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav. He was in Chikkamagaluru to participate in the 15th anniversary of the Karnataka Komu Souharda Vedike, a forum for communal harmony in Karnataka. Excerpts from the interview.
You keep taking names of youths in your speeches. Do you have any specific plans with like-minded young leaders?
I will be going to Delhi in the second week of January. We will hold a serious discussion on launching this platform. We will try to unite all the students’ movements and weave the network in such a manner that something concrete emerges out of it. With that, we can put the BJP on the back foot, and expose how its model of development has been anti-youth. Modiji promised that he will give two crore jobs every year.
By now, 8 crore youths should have got jobs. Not even half a per cent of his promise has been fulfilled.
Have you spoken to Congress president Rahul Gandhi or any other leaders with regard to your role in the coming elections?
Nothing much so far. I will be meeting the big shots of various political parties soon. I want to meet Mayawatiji and Akhilesh Yadav. A few days back, I received a call from Mamata didi also.
In recent days, you have been speaking about unity of Muslims and Dalit. What are your plans?
In Vadgam, I saw a fabulous show of unity between Dalits and Muslims. I gained support from Dalit and Muslim youths.
By and large, these communities are coming together in other parts of the country as well. Hopefully, we will be able to take this Dalit-Muslim unity forward, and with the likes of Kanhaiya and Shehla Rashid, we will be able to do something for Dalit-Muslim unity at the national-level as well.
MLAs elected from the reserved constituencies are often criticised for being silent about issues related to atrocities on Dalits.
Yes. If they talk more about the Dalit issue or become more vocal or assertive on the Dalit issues, the rest of the castes would get polarised against them. That’s how the grammar of politics has been. That can happen to me as well. But even at that cost, I prefer losing to remaining silent. I am basically an agitator.
