The Congress party's leadership after Rahul Gandhi's resignation in 2019 has been in debate constantly. Earlier, senior Congress leader and another member of the G-23 group, Kapil Sibal had reignited the debate after his remark on 'who is taking decisions in leadership'.
The Congress Working committee who makes the top body decisions in the party will meet on October 16th at the All India Congress Committee office to discuss the 'current political situation', said the party's general secretary K C Venugopal on Saturday.
The party leadership is also likely to decide on the schedule for electing the new Congress chief.
The decision to hold the meeting comes after G-23 member and senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad wrote a fresh letter to Congress President Sonia Gandhi asking her to convene an urgent meeting of the top body.
The Congress party's leadership after Rahul Gandhi's resignation in 2019 has been in debate constantly. Earlier, senior Congress leader and another member of the G-23 group, Kapil Sibal had reignited the debate after his remark on 'who is taking decisions in leadership'.
Kapil Sibal said that the group has written another letter to party president Sonia Gandhi to call a CWC meeting soon. The group also wrote and reiterated its demand of conducting all pending organisational elections including for the president post and Central election committee.
The abrupt resignation of Punjab Party chief Navjot Singh Sidhu earlier this month has also triggered a fresh turmoil in Congress. The Congress had replaced Amarinder Singh as Punjab chief minister with Charanjit Singh Channi following a bitter power tussle between Sidhu and Amarinder.
The party, in its CWC meeting, held on January 22 had decided that the Congress would have an elected president by June 2021, but the same was deferred at the May 10 CWC meet in the wake of the COVID-19 situation.
The latest meeting is being held in the wake of Lakhimpur clashes on October 3 in which eight people lost their lives, including four farmers who were allegedly run over by an SUV belonging to the convoy of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Kumar Mishra.
The incident has given enough ammo to the Congress to corner the BJP government and recapture the lost political space.
The CWC meeting will also discuss certain dissenting notes rising within the party over the spate of defections and the party's poor electoral fortunes.
Sonia Gandhi took over as the interim Congress president in August 2019 after Rahul Gandhi resigned in the wake of the party's Lok Sabha debacle in May 2019. There have been demands from a section of Congress leaders for having a full-time and active party president as well as an organisational overhaul.
The demand grew louder after a storm in the party in August last year over a letter to Sonia Gandhi by a group of 23 leaders, including Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Bhupinder Hooda, Prithviraj Chavan, Kapil Sibal, Manish Tewari and Mukul Wasnik raising these issues.
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