Women empowerment and protecting the interests of farmers are two of the topmost priorities for any government that comes to power in India, according to a survey. The nationwide survey was conducted by Indian Political Action Committee’s (I-PAC) arm National Agenda Forum (NAF), which was launched in June 2018 in an attempt to set the agenda for the country’s future.
The I-PAC was established in April 2015 and is India’s first cross-party advocacy group, which endeavours to support the election of visionary, progressive and inclusive leaders to public offices, as per its website.
The results of the survey, which come before the 2019 parliamentary polls, highlights 10 important social issues that are to be attended to, in the coming years. Access to clean food, water and air for the masses, communal unity and promotion of regional languages are some of the other issues that found mention on the list.
The survey also picked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress President Rahul Gandhi as the two leaders who the participants thought were best suited to execute the items listed in the agenda. The participants also picked four chief ministers (CMs) – Delhi’s Arvind Kejriwal, West Bengal’s Mamata Banerjee, Odisha’s Naveen Patnaik and Bihar’s Nitish Kumar -- as the best-suited CMs to fulfil the agenda.
The participants of the NAF survey also chose 10 popular non-political personalities whom they would want in active politics. Actors Aamir Khan and Akshay Kumar, activist Anna Hazare, Nobel Laureate Kailash Satyarthi, cricketers Sourav Ganguly and MS Dhoni, industrialist Ratan Tata, journalist Ravish Kumar, economist and former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan as well as entrepreneur and controversial Yoga teacher Baba Ramdev were the picks by the respondents of the survey.
The survey garnered responses from more than 57 lakh people across the country and spanned over two months. The primary task for the NAF now will be to take this agenda to the masses and to the political parties by getting the priority list items in their election manifestos.