NEW DELHI: Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, who took over the party in December, has rolled out the process of change in the organisation. As a first step, Rahul has dissolved the all-powerful Congress Working Committee (CWC), which takes all key decisions in the grand old party.
The CWC has been replaced with a Steering Committee, which has most of the CWC members and has been tasked with preparing for the AICC plenary likely in March. The first meeting of the steering committee will be held on February 17.
Key party decisions like Rahul’s election as party chief, and reconstitution of other important party panels, including the CWC, will be endorsed at the plenary session by around 1,500 AICC delegates from all over the country.
The Steering Committee includes most CWC members such as Rahul, Sonia Gandhi, former PM Manmohan Singh, Ahmed Patel, Ghulam Nabi Azad, A K Antony, Digvijaya Singh, Ashok Gehlot, P Chidambaram, Anand Sharma, Karan Singh, Motilal Vora and Janardan Dwivedi. The younger lot is represented through RPN Singh (who was recently made in charge of Jharkhand) and Randeep Surjewala, who heads the media department.
Sources said the revamped CWC is likely to be a mix of youth and experience, which in effect would mean that while not all veterans will lose their positions, some younger faces may be inducted into the key party body.
The changes in the AICC would also be endorsed in the plenary and there too a mix of young and old leaders would be maintained, the sources said.
Changes in the party were expected after Rahul took over as Congress chief in December 2017 marking the culmination of the party’s internal elections which saw new office bearers getting appointed across states.