DMK president and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Wednesday requested leaders of key political parties across the country to nominate their party representatives to the All India Federation of Social Justice, a platform he announced on January 26.
“At this juncture when repressive forces are challenging the progress made in social justice over decades, it is vital that all progressive forces join hands to protect the interests of the oppressed. Only together we can bring real and meaningful social justice to the oppressed,” he said in a letter to 38 political party leaders including Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, RJD leader Lalu Prasad, SP leader Akilesh Yadav and the Chief Ministers of non-BJP ruled States.
He said the objective of the platform was to bring together leaders, members of civil society, like-minded individuals and organisations to strive towards achieving the principles of federalism and social justice at the national level.
“The federation will be a platform for us to create a roadmap to take forward the battle for social justice in India and to identify areas in which we can do more and bring about a common minimum programme to be uniformly adopted by all States,” he said in the letter.
Contending that “our unique, diverse and multi-cultural federation is under threat of bigotry and religious hegemony”, Mr. Stalin said these forces could be fought only if all those who believed in equality and social justice were united together.
“It is not a question of political gain but re-establishing the pluralistic identity of our Republic, as visualised by our founding fathers,” he said.
Mr. Stalin reiterated “reservations are not sufficient to ensure social justice”, saying that at every step the oppressed should be accorded positive affirmation to enable them to unshackle centuries of oppression and exclusion from mainstream society.
“We must take extraordinary steps to eradicate gender discrimination along with caste discrimination and also enable the differently-abled to compete in the mainstream,” he said.
Mr. Stalin said time had finally arrived to stand together as a true Union of States to achieve the objectives. “We must unite with the same conviction and purpose as we did to establish the Mandal Commission. In each State, the oppressed classes are yearning to have the doors of opportunity opened to them, he said.
