NEW DELHI: Some of the senior Congress ‘dissenters’, including Kapil Sibal and Shashi Tharoor, met at their senior colleague Ghulam Nabi Azad’s house on Monday evening after the CWC debated their letter to the party’s interim chief Sonia Gandhi seeking urgent organisational reforms.
Azad, who is Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha, and Sharma, deputy leader of the House, felt humiliated the way their colleagues levied charges against them and their loyalties to the party were being questioned, said sources.
During the meeting, charges levied by some close party colleagues like Ambika Soni and Kumari Selja were also discussed.
The meeting at Azad's residence was held as the press briefing by Congress general secretary KC Venugopal and Randeep Singh Surjewala was ongoing and ended an hour later following which the leaders left for their respective destinations.
It is noteworthy that all the aforementioned leaders were signatories to the letter written by over 20 leaders in which they had sought sweeping changes including "full time" active leadership, a mechanism for collective leadership to guide the party's revival and demanded elections to CWC.
The meeting was also attended by Mukul Wasnik and Manish Tewari, along with some other signatories to the letter who were present in the national capital, sources said.
The leaders discussed the resolution passed at the CWC meeting, which urged Sonia Gandhi to continue as its interim chief till an AICC session can be convened and authorised her to effect necessary organisational changes to deal with the challenges facing the party.
None of the leaders agreed to comment on their deliberations, which took place soon after CWC meet ended.
The CWC in its unanimous resolution after the meeting had said that "CWC makes it clear that no one will be or can be permitted to undermine or weaken the party and its leadership at this juncture".
It said the responsibility of every Congress worker and leader today is to fight the pernicious assault on India's democracy, pluralism and diversity by the Modi Government.
The resolution said inner-party issues cannot be deliberated through the media or in public for and urged and advises all concerned to raise such issues only in party fora in the interest of propriety and discipline.
The CWC also asked Sonia Gandhi to continue as the interim president of the party till the next AICC session is convened and further authorised her to make appropriate organisational changes that she may deem fit to take on the many challenges facing the country and the party.
(With ANI Inputs)