Three days after the huge debacle of the party in the recent State Assembly elections, a meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) on Sunday decided to continue Sonia Gandhi as the Congress President, ignoring the chorus of G23 for a leadership overhaul.
This, when the demand for a leadership change has no longer remained confined to the group of 23 dissenters, called G23, but has swollen to a larger group. The CWC meeting was convened to discuss the poll debacle.
The excruciating defeat in the five states has revived searing criticism of the Gandhi family and demands for a complete overhaul and leadership change are increasing.
However, not all believe that the Congress is on the last leg of extinction and there is hope. Senior leader and Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor, for one, pointed out that the Congress has the largest number of MLAs in the country in the Opposition camp and asserted that it was “worth reforming and reviving”.
Taking to Twitter, Tharoor shared a list of the number of MLAs that respective parties in the county have nationwide. According to the list shared by him, the Congress has over 750 MLAs, the most after the BJP which has over 1,400 legislators.
Sources say the Congress organisational elections to select a new party chief, scheduled in August-September, which was expected to be advanced by a couple of months might not happen now.
The four-hour meeting of the CWC, the party’s highest decision-making body, finally decided to continue Sonia Gandhi as Congress president.
Earlier, a number of Congress workers gathered in support of former party chief Rahul Gandhi near the AICC headquarter in Delhi ahead of the crucial meeting. In fact, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot pitched for Rahul Gandhi as the president ahead of the meeting.
Among the key absentees, former defence minister AK Antony skipped the Congress’s top body meeting today after testing positive for Covid. “He is extremely disappointed for not being able to attend today’s CWC meeting,” tweeted his son Anil K Antony.
We Accept People’s Verdict: Rahul Gandhi After Congress Loses In All 5 States
