CWC urges Sonia to continue as Interim President
   Date :25-Aug-2020

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NEW DELHI :
 
Rahul questions timing of letter to Sonia, insinuates it helped BJP

Manmohan Singh, Antony ask Sonia to continue as party chief.
 
 
The Congress Working Committee on Monday urged Sonia Gandhi to continue as the party’s interim chief and to bring about necessary changes to strengthen the organisation, sources said. The CWC also decided to convene the AICC (All India Congress Committee) session at the earliest possible time to start the process for selecting the new party President, sources added. At the crucial CWC meeting, Gandhi is said to have offered to quit, but she was urged to stay on as the interim chief.
 
The meeting followed a letter by more than 20 party leaders demanding an “active, full-time and visible” President. Though a large section of the leaders backed Sonia Gandhi at the nearly seven-hour virtual meeting of the Congress’ highest decision making body to discuss the pivotal leadership issue, the faultlines were clear and appeared to deepen at some points as the day progressed. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the demand for Sonia Gandhi continuing as Congress President and leader after leader echoed him while attacking the letter writers, particularly Ghulam Nabi Azad, the senior-most signatory and a CWC member, sources said. P Chidambaram suggested the holding of a virtual AICC session to start the process of holding elections for a new party chief.
 
Former President Rahul Gandhi, it is learnt, launched a sharp attack against the signatories, questioning their timing as well as the fact they went public with their grievances. He also rued the fact that the letter – seeking sweeping changes to the party organisation and elections to the CWC -- was written when Sonia Gandhi was in hospital and the party was battling a political crisis in Rajasthan. He said Sonia Gandhi had accepted charge as party President only after the CWC last year urged her to take the responsibility.
 
“It is the CWC and not the media, where we voice our grievances and discuss issues,” sources quoted Rahul Gandhi as telling the CWC members. They also said Rahul insinuated that the letter would help the BJP. Earlier in the day, Kapil Sibal, senior leader and one of the signatories of the letter, created a flutter when he hit out at Rahul Gandhi on Twitter for a purported remark on the BJP. Sibal, who is not a part of the CWC, withdrew his tweet a little later.
 
 
“Was informed by Rahul Gandhi personally that he never said what was attributed to him. I therefore withdraw my tweet,” he said on Twitter. The Congress also denied that Rahul Gandhi had accused any party leader of “colluding with the BJP”. “Rahul Gandhi hasn’t said a word of this nature nor alluded to it. Please don’t be misled by false media discourse or misinformation being spread. “But yes, we all need to work together in fighting the draconian Modi rule rather then fighting & hurting each other and the Congress,” the party’s chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said on Twitter, tagging Sibal’s earlier tweet. Azad, too, attempted to set the record straight.
 
The Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha said a section of media is “wrongly attributing that, in CWC I told Shri Rahul Gandhi to prove that the letter written by us is in collusion with BJP – ‘let me make it very clear that Shri Rahul Gandhi has neither in CWC nor outside said that this letter was written at the behest of BJP.” Azad was at the proverbial centre of the storm in the CWC. Former Defence Minister A K Antony termed the letter “cruel”, while his colleague Ambika Soni described the missive as unfortunate and said the party had given Azad a lot. Sources said Azad offered to resign at the meeting amid questions being raised on the letter, its timing and its leakage to the media. Sonia Gandhi also referred to Azad twice in her opening remarks, saying he had even sent a reminder to his letter, the sources said.
 
To this she had said she had given her reply to K C Venugopal expressing her desire to be relieved of the post and the party should initiate the process to find her replacement. While most leaders backed Sonia’s continuation as party chief, there were some who proposed Rahul Gandhi’s return as President, the sources said. Giving details of the proceedings, they said Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his Chhattisgarh counterpart Bhupesh Baghel urged Rahul Gandhi to take charge in case Sonia Gandhi wishes to withdraw.