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.
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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.”