Congress presidential poll candidate Mallikarjun Kharge on Tuesday and asserted that he would ensure 50 per cent tickets to youths from different sections of the party and the society in all elections.

“We have decided to give 50 per cent reservation or seats to the youths in the elections. I will make all efforts to implement it, if I become the party president. I will ensure that everybody agrees to it and the youths contest the polls,” Kharge said.

Speaking in the same vein, the Rajya Sabha member said the reservation would be applicable to the youths across different sections — the Dalits, the backward castes, general category, women, and various other organisations and institutions of the party. By the word “youth”, Kharge meant those aged up to 50 years.

Kharge was talking to reporters after addressing a meeting of Congress delegates and leaders at Sadaquat Ashram — the party headquarters in Bihar. Congress’s Bihar unit president Madan Mohan Jha, Rajya Sabha member Akhilesh Prasad Singh, party spokesperson Gourav Vallabh and other leaders were also present.

“We will also work for the welfare and protection of farmers, people working in the unorganised sectors and public sector enterprises. We will also focus on strengthening the organisational structure and frontal organisations of the party in various states.

“This election is a family matter of the party and my manifesto is the Udaipur declaration that we adopted in May this year,” Kharge said.

Asked about the Congress’s stand on chief minister Nitish Kumar’s efforts to unite the Opposition to take on the BJP in the 2024 elections, Kharge evaded a direct reply.

“I will speak on this issue after being elected the party president,” he said.

Nitish and his Janata Dal United (JDU) quit the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in August this year and joined hands with the Grand Alliance to form a government in Bihar. The Congress is a part of the alliance.

The Bihar chief minister has been rooting for a broad-based, pan-India unity of non-BJP parties for the next general elections and has even met Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi for the purpose.

However, sources say that the Congress is yet to warm up to the idea.

Talking to the reporters, Kharge revealed that senior leaders of the party asked him to contest the election for the top post just 18 hours before the filing of nomination papers.

“I entered the fray with the view that our leader Rahul Gandhi should have taken up the position. When I questioned why I have been asked to contest the election, I was told that he (Rahul) did not want any member of the Gandhi family to occupy the post,” Kharge added.

Kharge hit out at the BJP for insinuating that he would just be a puppet whose strings would be pulled by the Gandhi family.

“Sonia Gandhi has been the party president for 20 years. Rahul Gandhi has been the party president for two years. If I take advice from them to strengthen our organisation, what wrong is there in it?

“We believe in collective leadership and taking along everybody with us, while they (the BJP) harbour bad intentions and can never speak anything good about anyone,” Kharge said.

Kharge, 80, hails from Karnataka and has been elected an MLA nine times and a Lok Sabha member twice.

Apart from serving as a minister in his state and at the Centre, he has served as the leader of the Opposition in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly, the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.

He is pitted against Shashi Tharoor, the Lok Sabha member from Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala), in the Congress presidential election, which will be held on October 17.