Cong manifesto to be ready before LS poll dates are announced: Tharoor
Kolkata (PTI): Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Saturday said that the first draft of the party's manifesto for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections would be released by February 15 and the final one would come out before the poll dates are announced.
He also expressed hope that the opposition bloc INDIA might choose elements from the manifestos of parties in the alliance and come up with one having a list of the core issues.
"We have our internal procedures. The first draft should be ready by February 15 but thereafter it has to be agreed upon and adopted by our working committee. But certainly, by the time the Election Commission announces the elections, our manifesto will be ready and out," he said.
Tharoor participated in 'Shape the Future', a programme jointly hosted by the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee and the All India Professionals' Congress, for constructive input from cross-sections of the civil society for preparing the party's manifesto.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP is also a member of the committee to prepare the party manifesto.
"I think each party is going to be working on its own manifesto... It is entirely possible that the INDIA alliance will choose elements from all the manifestos in common and come up with a core list of issues," he added.
Tharoor said the manifestos would focus on the issues of unemployment, price rise, the need for income support for the poor, women's rights, youths and farmers.
The objective of Saturday's interactive session was to gather impartial, spontaneous, and value-added views from different segments of the society on issues that they felt to be addressed by a union government, a Congress leader said.
Tharoor heard stakeholders from the Industry, Economy, Healthcare, Banking, Education, Information Technology, Human Resources, Literature, Cultural, Legal and Diversity segments.
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Trump says he ‘hasn’t even thought about’ continuing Iran ceasefire
Washington: US President Donald Trump has said he has not yet considered whether he would continue the ceasefire involving Iran, while also claiming the United States holds the advantage in negotiations.
Speaking to reporters, Trump said he was prepared to make a deal with “whoever is running the show” in Iran.
“They are fighting with each other, there’s tremendous infighting. They’re probably fighting for leadership in many cases. I think they’re fighting not to be leader because we knocked out two levels of leaders,” he said.
Trump added, “When they want they can call me. We have all the cards, we’ve won everything.”
Referring to ongoing negotiations, he said, “They gave us a paper that should’ve been better. And, interestingly, immediately when I cancelled it [envoy trip to Pakistan], within 10 minutes we got a new paper that was much better.”
“We talked about they will not have a nuclear weapon, very simple … They offered a lot, but not enough,” he added.
When asked whether he would continue the ceasefire, Trump replied, “I haven’t even thought about it.”
The remarks come as uncertainty remains over the future of the temporary truce and broader negotiations between Washington and Tehran.
