NEW DELHI, Mar 15: With the Lok Sabha election schedule due to be announced on Saturday, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) will work on ground to ensure 100% voting, its joint general secretary Manmohan Vaidya said on Friday.
“To create awareness about voting, RSS volunteers will go door-to-door to request people to franchise their electoral rights,” Mr Vaidya added.
He further informed that a total of 19.39 crore families came in contact with the RSS during the ‘akshat’ (sacred rice) distribution campaign before the inauguration of Ram temple in Ayodhya which took place on January 22. “The enthusiastic response and reception received by this campaign reassured our faith in the people,” he said.
He added that every year, 15,000 to 17,000 young individuals participate in the RSS’s training programs that are categories in various ‘varg’ (class). More than one lakh requests to join the RSS are continuously coming on the organisation’s website for past seven years. In January and February 2024, these figures have doubled after the consecration of Ram Lalla.
While addressing a press conference on day one of the Akhil Bharatiya Pratinidhi Sabha which started on Friday in Nagpur and will continue till March 17, Mr Vaidya informed that the RSS has brought changes in the content of its yearly training programmes, known as the Sangh Shiksha Varga. The changes will be implemented from this year,
Sharing the expansion of the organisation, which has divided the country into 45 provinces, Mr Vaidya said a total of 73,117 daily shakhas (branches) are being organised across India. Among this, 4,466 are new shakhas that have come up since last year.
“Our shakhas include 60% students and 40% other people. In this, the number of adults above 40 years of age is 11%. The number of weekly meetings is 27,717, which has increased by 840 weekly meetings from last year,” Mr Vaidya said adding that there is a target to increase the number of daily shakhas to 1 lakh by next year which is also a centenary year of the RSS.
Speaking about the RSS’s participation in women related issues, the senior official said 460 women’s conferences were held in 44 provinces through Rashtra Sevika Samiti – the RSS’s parallel for women – in which 5.61 lakh women participated. “RSS’s purpose is to increase the active participation of women in Indian thinking and social change,” Mr Vaidya said.
(Manas Dasgupta)
