Today Congress Committee will convene a meeting which includes top decision and policy-making body of the party to discuss on the regard of Presidential Election 2017. The Congress party will discuss other things also which includes the presidential contest and current political situation. In the last meeting of CWC, which was convened in November 2016, saw party appealing to Vice-president Rahul Gandhi to take over as Congress president. However, till date, the transition has not happened so far. The CWC may not reopen the issue as the organizational election process is already under way.
7 months after the Congress Committee expressed a “strong sentiment” for VP Rahul Gandhi’s elevation as party president; Congress President Sonia Gandhi is likely to preside over the party’s highest policy body meeting. The meeting begins this morning to ratify the timeline for the organizational elections slated for later this year.
The Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting at Mrs. Sonia Gandhi’s residence comes against the backdrop of attempts by the Congress Party to unite opposition parties ahead of the presidential election 2017 next month and put together a broad coalition of opposition parties ahead of the 2019 Lok-Sabha elections to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Last year in November, the Committee had discussed Mr. Rahul Gandhi’s elevation and expressed their strong sentiments for his promotion. But Congress leader Digvijaya Singh said that the meeting does not want to take the decision on the leadership role in the absence of Congress president Mrs. Gandhi. Sonia Gandhi could not attend the meeting because she was unwell.
The agenda of the Congress Working Committee meeting is the present political situation. An informal meeting of top opposition leaders will also occur before the meet. On Sunday the Congress leaders had organized a public meeting in Guntur district where many opposition leaders have shared the stage with Mr. Rahul Gandhi.
This is the first meeting of the top panel of Congress committee after it was washed out in UP and Uttarakhand in the assembly elections. Apart from another round of introspection, earlier Rahul Gandhi concluded that organizational and structural changes were required to revive the Congress party.
According to him, the Congress has to complete internal elections by this year-end. The presidential election is expected to take place in the 2nd week of October. The election will be followed by another round to appoint the members of the party’s highest decision-making body. The Congress Working Committee (CWC) has 25 members and 12 of them have to be elected by All India Congress Committee members. According to Rahul Gandhi, since 1997, there has been no need to conduct elections to the working Committee. The Working Committee of Congress does have powers to appoint party chief and later get it ratified by the members of the Congress party but Mr. Gandhi has been keen that he is democratically elected.
