The party has launched a mass contact programme in all districts where camps are being organised to address the grievances of the masses.

With people asked to fill up forms giving particulars about themselves and list their grievances, party cadres plan to help them obtain ration cards, voter identity cards, pension benefits, micro credit and physical disability assistance from the Government. State convenor of the party Sushil Mishra says,” We plan to cover each residential colony under this drive and convey to the people that ours is a party willing to take up their issues.”

Talking to The Indian Express on the sidelines of one such camp here on Sunday, the President of NCP’s youth wing Rajeev Kumar Jha said,” We are targeting the lower strata of the society in our drive. These are the people who have maximum grievances that need to be addressed.”

He said that after adopting a wait and watch policy regarding the performance of the B C Khanduri Government in Uttarakhand, the NCP will now launch a series of programmes to highlight its failures on various fronts. “Leading a unit of the Army is one thing and running a democratically elected Government is something else. The Army rules cannot be applied to civil life. The Khanduri Government must fulfill the promises made to the people,” he said.

The party’s leadership mostly comprised dissident Congress leaders and while it managed to win a single seat in the 2002 Assembly elections, it drew a blank in the 2007 elections even though it was responsible for the defeat of Congress candidates in at least nine constituencies. On the prospects of an alliance with the Congress in the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls Mishra said,” This is for the party’s central leadership to decide.”