Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee President Arvinder Singh lovely delivered an insipid speech and failed to enliven the party workers. His 10-minute speech did not inspire confidence despite Delhi being the host city at AICC one-day session in Talkatora Stadium in the Capital. While speaking on the occasion, lovely said that Congress will be back soon but he failed to enumerate his speech with steps that Delhi Congress intends to take to come back in the reckoning as AAP was making waves in the national Capital.
Meanwhile, the chant for Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate for 2014 General Elections got louder with thousands of enthusiastic party workers making it clear that they would not take ‘No’ for an answer. Strong sentiments among the party workers for Rahul Gandhi as the Prime Minister was quite evident despite Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s categorical ‘No’ for naming Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate. The mood among the Congress workers was somewhat sombre on Thursday after the refusal came from the Congress President. The mood was upbeat after the party high command announced that Rahul Gandhi will lead the 2014 poll campaign.
“Rahul Gandhi Zindabad rent the air and it was pretty visible on Friday. It required the intervention of the Congress President to scotch such enthusiasm after she made it known to the people that her decision not to announce Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate was final. It however failed to diminish the zeal of the Congress workers who kept on chanting ‘Rahul, Rahul’ after Sonia Gandhi ended her speech. “We want Rahul Gandhi to fight Narendra Modi,” said a Congress delegate from Gujarat.
“There is no question of accepting any other candidate other than Rahul Gandhi as the next Prime Minister. Our party had adopted a resolution in Panchmarhi conclave that those above 60 years of age will not contest lok Sabha elections but will be accommodated in Rajya Sabha,” said a Congress worker from Uttar Pradesh. There were slogans for Priyanka Gandhi too as her names kept on surfacing during the sloganeering. Workers kept on clapping and raising the name of Rahul Gandhi and even gentle chiding by the Gandhi scion failed to silence them.
“I wanted Rahul Gandhi to be announced the PM candidate... I hope that when they do announce a candidate, it will be Rahul Gandhi,” said Ramya, 31, the youngest lok Sabha member, who is attending her first such Congress conclave.