 Congress President Sonia Gandhi, members of the Congress Working Committee, PCC presidents and CLP leaders, AICC office bearers, delegates of the Shivir friends, I'd like to welcome all of you here today. We have been having discussions now for the last few days and everybody, the leadership of the Congress Party has been taking part in these discussions. I was involved in some of the discussions, I went to all the rooms and while I was listening to the discussions, all of you and of course those discussions were held in closed rooms so the people of our country don't know the level of conversation that was taking place, the type of conversation that was taking place, the intelligence of the conversation that was taking place, but I got to see it. And while I was watching this, I was asking myself the question, which other political party in this country would allow this type of a conversation. A conversation where the senior most leadership is bluntly told without holding back, without any hesitation is bluntly told what the Congress Party feels. I was thinking to myself, certainly the RSS and the BJP would never allow such a thing. In fact, many of our leaders, Aryaji is here, many of our leaders who have come back have said to me exactly what the BJP allows them to say and doesn't allow them to say. Aryaji himself told me that as a Dalit in the BJP, he had no place. As a Dalit in the BJP, he was humiliated every single day. These are his words and there are other parties, regional parties and with all respect, even the regional parties would not tolerate the type of conversation that we have just had. And this conversation, this is not something new in the Congress. This didn't happen just yesterday or day before. We are attacked for it. Every day in the media, we are attacked because we allow conversation inside our party. Every day, we are attacked. But there is a reason. There is a reason we allow conversation. This party's DNA is a conversation between the people of this country. Doesn't matter where they come from, doesn't matter whether they are rich or poor, what community they are from, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Christian, anybody. This party has always provided a platform for a conversation, a platform where people can speak without fear, without worry. And that is what this party continues to do. Unfortunately, this is not how the politics of the country is progressing. The politics of the country now does not entail a conversation. It does not entail the expression of views. It does not entail the expression of feelings. Some days back in Parliament, I made a speech where I said, India, Bharat, is a union of states. That is the line that is written in our constitution. India is not described as a nation. It is described as a union of states. Meaning, the states of India, the people of India, have come together to form the union. They have come together to form the union. And it is critical for the union of this country that the states and the people are allowed to have a conversation. Because the only alternative, and I say this with full responsibility, the only alternative to a conversation between the people of India is violence between the people of India. You can either choose to have a conversation between the people of India or then you can choose to have violence between the people of India. And this conversation that takes place between the people of India, between the states of India, the instruments of this conversation, the mechanism of this conversation are the institutions that the Congress party, that your great leaders, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Patel, Azadji, Ambedkarji, have helped us create. These institutions do not belong to any one individual. They do not belong to a political party. They belong to the union of India. They belong to every single person in this union. And today what we are seeing is the systematic destruction, the systematic destruction of the institutions that help the states of India speak to each other. We see it, those of us who are in parliament, we see it in parliament house. Our mics are shut off. Members are thrown out of the house. Conversations are not allowed. We see it when the judiciary is pressurized. We see it when the arms of the election commission are twisted. We see it when the media is muzzled. And we say, OK, we lightly say that the conversation is being muzzled. But what we do not understand is the consequence of this muzzling. India does not understand it yet. Most people in this country do not understand it because the day these countries' institutions stop working, the day this country stops speaking to itself, the day this country does not communicate with itself effectively is the day that we will all be in very serious trouble. And you can already see, you can already see the tension. It is there for everybody to see. You speak to the press people, they will tell you that we are muzzled. You speak to the political class, speak to the leaders. Every single politician knows the word Pegasus. Then a single politician in this country who does not know what Pegasus is, Pegasus is not a software. Pegasus is the method of silencing the political class of this country. It is not simply a software. It is the way to strangle, it is the way to strangle the political discussion in this country. And so this is what we are seeing. Now the question is, how does the Congress party respond to this? It's a question on all your minds. We see economic collapse. Some days back, the Prime Minister said, we are going to be exporting wheat. And then suddenly, a few days later, we are not going to be exporting wheat. We put a ban on the export of wheat. My friends from Punjab and the rest of the country know the impact of the farm laws. You know what the farm laws were designed to do. And you know the devastation and the pain that the farm laws caused to the people of Punjab. And had they not been stopped, what would have happened to Punjab? And you know, you spoke to me yesterday, you know what is happening in Punjab today and the feelings that are rampant in Punjab today. Which is our youth. Today, the youth of India cannot get employment. Mr. Narendra Modi talked about giving employment to 2 crore youths. Today, unemployment has never been more than today. And these are their roots, not our roots. Why? Because the roots of the wheat that the employment creates, Mr. Narendra Modi has broken the roots of the wheat that BJP has broken and their thoughts have broken. They have signed the GST, they have signed the GST and they have completely benefited. After giving 2-3 big jobs, the government has destroyed the future of the youth of India. And you will get to see the coming times. The youth of India will not be able to get employment. On the one hand, unemployment, on the other hand, the cost. The fight has taken place in Ukraine. In the coming times, inflation will increase in a great way. And what we called as demographic dividend, it is dangerous that demographic dividend changes into demographic disaster. Who is responsible for this? The Congress Party is not responsible. The BJP is responsible, the government is responsible. But we too are responsible. Our responsibility is to fight the struggle of the poor and to stand with the people. Our complaint is that our complete discussion, our entire discussion, is in our internal matters. Who is getting the post? Our internal focus remains. And in today's time, our internal focus is not going to work. Our focus, our focus has to be an external focus. We will have to look towards the people. We will have to go to the people. And not just for us, but for the country. The whole discussion in the press is about the positions of the Congress Party. We should think without thinking. Whether we are senior leaders, or junior leaders, we should work. We should go and sit in the middle of the people without thinking. Those who have issues, they should understand. And those who had a connection with the people before us, those who have a connection with the people, we will have to accept it. We will have to make that connection again. And the people want, the people understand that the Congress Party can do this. The people understand that the Congress Party can take the country forward. This is our responsibility. And by listening to me, the Congress Party has decided, October has decided, that the whole Congress Party will go in the middle of the people, will travel, and the relationship with the people of the Congress Party, and will strengthen it once again. This is the way for us. And this is not going to happen from the shortcut. I am telling you, who thinks, that by doing the shortcut, this work can be done, this work cannot be done from the shortcut. This work will be done with patience, without patience. And you can do it. You have the power, we all have the power, and this is our DNA. We were born from the people. This association has come out of the people. So we have to go in the middle of the people once again. About the Congress Party, many things have been discussed, about our economic policies, about our political positions, about youngsters, the future of India's youth, the weaker sections, farmers, we had all these discussions. And we have prepared papers that give us a clear direction on where we have to go. But I do feel that there are some things which are already in those papers, which I would like to repeat here, which the Congress Party must think very seriously about doing. I've said that we must have a mass contact program where all of us, regardless of our age, our position, where all of us go to the people of India and spend not one day, two days, but months with the people of India. Understand what the people of India want and what the people of India are saying. Understand what the farmers want, what the laborers want. This to me is the first step. The second step is transforming the nature of the Congress Party. Not the nature in terms of its thinking, not the nature in terms of its ideology, but its nature in terms of the way we do our work. The 21st century is about communication. And if there is one area where our opponents outdo us, it is in communication. They have much more money than us and they are better at communication than we are. So we must think about communication, completely reform our communication systems and communicate with the people of India, with the youngsters in a new way. This is a recommendation that has already been made. I'm just repeating it. I think the idea that certain positions, certain numbers of positions should be for younger people is a very important idea. I am not saying that there should be no older people, but I am saying that when it comes to BCCs, when it comes to BCCs, when it comes to our leadership, we should have a healthy mix of youngsters and seniors. And I think the time has come where we aggressively do this, where we aggressively put new BCCs, new BCCs. There are DCCs who have been there for 15, 20 years. We aggressively change these DCCs and BCCs and make them the pivot of the party and make sure that they are young, dynamic and fully trained in the ideas and the ideology of the Congress party so they can take on the vicious propaganda and the divisive politics of the RSS. I also feel, and that has also been stated, that we must ensure the idea that one person per family should get a ticket. I know Venugopal has made a caveat to that, but I do think that it is very important that we limit the number of family members that are involved in our organization. Let them work, let them develop and then let them join the organization. But we must not have a situation where five or six or seven members of a family are in the organization. So I think these things are of importance. From my perspective, I am your family. You are my family. I don't see you. And I am not just talking about you. You are my family. And I am not just talking about you. There are 500 or 600 people here. But I am talking about the leaders of every Congress. I am talking about working. This is a family. And I am your family. My fight is the RSS and BJP's ideology which is a danger in front of the country. My fight is with that ideology which spreads hatred and violence. I fight against it and I want to fight. This is a fight of my life for me. I am not ready to believe that in my beloved country, in our beloved country so much hatred, so much anger and violence can spread. I am not ready to believe that. There are great powers against us. The RSS, BJP's organization. Nowadays, all the institutions of India don't think that we are fighting with a political party. We are not fighting with a political party. A political party is just a part of it. We are fighting with every institution of India. We are fighting against the biggest capitalists of India. Truth. But I want to say the work of every Congress. And I want to say the leader of the Congress. You don't need to be afraid. You don't need to be afraid. Because this country believes in truth. This country is the country of truth. And this country is understanding. This country is watching. The state of the country is understanding the country. So I want to tell you that I am standing with you all my life. And I am going to fight this fight with you. I am not afraid of these powers. I don't care. I don't want to spend a single rupee in my life. I don't want to be afraid. I don't want to be afraid. I haven't taken any money from my mother India. And I am not afraid of speaking the truth. So I want to tell you this from the work of every Congress. This is the fight of all of us. We are all involved in this fight. I am involved with you. We are all senior leaders. We are all Congress presidents. We will all unite and defeat BJP and RSS. Sometimes our senior leaders are depressed. It is normal. Because it is not easy to fight. Don't think that it is easy to fight. This fight cannot be fought by the regional party. Because it is a fight of thoughts. You have seen a thought of RSS. A thought of Congress. BJP will talk about Congress. It will talk about Congress's leaders. It will talk about Congress's workers. But it will not talk about the regional party. Because they know that the regional party is their place. But they cannot defeat BJP. Because they do not have a thought of Congress. They have different approaches. One is our centralized approach. And the other is our thought of Congress. So it is not an easy fight. And it is not a political fight. It is a fight of the future of the country. And it is a fight to save the country. And you will see. Now this fight has started. You will see in the coming time. It will be a fire in India. I talked about COVID. Remember. I am telling you. The more we break these institutions. The more we break these institutions. We will end the conversation between religions and caste. We will suppress it. It will be a fire in India. I am telling you clearly. And the work of the Congress Party. It is to start that conversation again. The work of the Congress Party. It is to protect the institutions. It is our job. No regional party will do it. The BJP will not do it. The RSS will not do it. The Congress Party will do it. We have never attacked the institutions of India. We have never hidden the work of the Congress Party. We have never put it in the institutions of India. RSS and BJP are doing this. Not only in the institutions. But everywhere they are putting their people in it. And the conversation between the people is over. On the one hand, unemployment. Young people are not able to see the way. It is expensive. And on the other hand, you are breaking the institutional structure of India. The conversation between the people in India is closing. It is our responsibility to stop the fire. It is our responsibility. It is our responsibility to go between the people. And tell the people that it is being divided. It is being broken. And the country is not strong. The country is weak. It will not benefit us. It will be a loss. It is our responsibility. It is our responsibility to do our work. It is our responsibility to our politicians. And this work can only be done by the people of the Congress Party. Because the Congress Party is the party of everyone. In this country, there is no such caste, no such religion, no such person who can say that the Congress Party has closed its doors for me. There is no one in this country. Regional parties are of some caste. They are not of everyone. This is the same party that is the party of the whole country. So I wanted to tell you that there is no need to worry. We will go down on the road. We will go down on the road. And from the perspective of BJP RSS, like when the Congresses fight, we will fight with all our strength. All of you came here and showed us the way forward. You gave us a direction. Leaders, senior leaders showed us, told us where we should go. And I think there is a lot of clarity in terms of where the Congress Party has to go in terms of policy, in terms of thinking, what our positions should be, what our political positions should be. I think there is tremendous clarity that has come out of this discussion. In fact, you yourselves have told me that there is a lot of clarity that has come out of this discussion. I think that these discussions are very useful. And I think we should have these discussions much more often, much more systematically. It allows the Congress Party to come together. It allows us to feel like a family. It allows us to talk to each other. And I think it helps us move forward with a strong, in a strong and dynamic way. So I'd like to thank all of you for coming here today. Namaskar. Jai Hind.