THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The call by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge for an organisational overhaul may derail the plans of some senior leaders in the state party who are engaged in image building, with their eyes set firmly on the assembly election scheduled for May of 2026.
Kharge’s call came at the Congress working committee (CWC) meeting in Belagavi, Karnataka. Emphasising the need to fill organisational vacancies and introduce new leaders, he stressed that hard work alone won’t win elections.
The CWC also decided to fully implement the Udaipur declaration. “The call for organisational restructuring is giving a blank cheque to the high command,” a KPCC leader said. “After the period of mourning for former PM Manmohan Singh, the high command will chalk out policies and modalities to be implemented at various levels.
We expect the high command to engage with the future course of action as it has declared that 2025 will be the year for reorganising the party. Next year is lean in terms of assembly elections, with only Delhi and Bihar being deciding. They want to complete the process by 2026, which will see four states electing their legislatures, including Kerala,” he said.
The high command has a performance report of each of the PCC leaderships. Despite the fact that new DCC presidents have been named, they are not aware of the new status that gives the high command licence to intervene at any time and at any level. Since Kharge assumed leadership, there has been no restructuring carried out at the DCC and KPCC levels.
“There might be a complete overhaul, or the high command may decide to restructure just KPCC and DCC office-bearers,” a CWC member told TNIE. “The KPCC executive has not met as its leadership did not want to come under criticism from state leaders. As the KPCC executive morphed into a jumbo committee, they formed a political affairs panel, which has also not met. These are issues to be addressed,” he said.
The Udaipur declaration said that it is important to ensure that 50% of office-bearers in the CWC, PCCs, DCCs, block and mandal committees are below the age of 50. It called for adequate representation for tribals, dalits and women, besides a ‘political affairs committee’ in every state. The declaration also criticised the leadership’s intolerance of criticism.
If the high command decides to issue this recommendation, leaders believe that there would be a change of equation within the state party.
Meanwhile, sources close to the high command say that reorganisation of the state unit is yet to be discussed. “However, we have been getting reports about certain activities of leaders using the media,” sources said.