NEW DELHI: Ending weeks of uncertainty over his continuation as Congress president, Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday made it clear that there was no going back on his decision to resign and targeted senior party leaders for not taking responsibility for the Lok Sabha election debacle.
“Rebuilding the party requires hard decisions and numerous people will have to be made accountable for the failure of 2019. It would be unjust to hold others accountable but ignore my own responsibility as president of the party,” he said in the four-page letter.
During a meeting with members of the Youth Congress last week, Rahul had expressed unhappiness over senior leaders not owning up responsibility for the party’s poor performance.
After this, many young party functionaries sent in their resignations but no such offer was forthcoming from the top leadership. On Monday, Rahul even met the five chief ministers of Congress-ruled states, who owned up responsibility but stopped short of quitting.
This is not the first time that Rahul has trained his guns on the senior party leadership. During the Congress Working Committee on May 25 when he resigned, he lashed out at them and named Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath and former minister P Chidambaram for insisting on tickets for their sons.
At the Congress Working Committee meeting, Rahul and party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi-Vadra also expressed anguish that while they went hammer and tongs at the alleged Rafale scam during the poll campaign, no other party leader spoke out forcefully at any public forum.
“It is a habit in India that the powerful cling to power, no one sacrifices power. But we will not defeat our opponents without sacrificing the desire for power and fighting a deeper ideological battle,” he said.
Minutes after tweeting his letter, Rahul changed his status on his official Twitter handle from party president to ‘Congress member’.
According to the Congress constitution, if the party president resigns, then the senior-most general secretary will discharge his duties until the CWC appoints a provisional chief pending election of a regular president by the AICC.
Going by this clause, nonagenarian Motilal Vora will automatically become the interim chief of the party.