Taking no chance in the North-Eastern State of Manipur following its experience in Arunachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, Congress on Tuesday replaced Manipur Congress chief Gaikhangam Gangmei with TN Haokip.
The development comes days after Congress president Sonia Gandhi had summoned Manipur Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh and Deputy Chief Minister Gaikhangam in connection with dissidence within the ruling Congress.
Manipur is scheduled for Assembly polls February next year and thus most of the dissidents are eyeing to become Ministers.
The political change in Arunachal Pradesh and now at Uttarakhand is still fresh in the minds of the party and high command did not want to take any chance since the bigger one of the seven sisters in NE, Assam, goes to poll soon and top political leaders of the country have been camping there now.
The formula of Chief Minister Ibobi to drop two or three Ministers and induct new ones is not acceptable to the dissidents whose strength is more than 25 in the ClP having 48 members since they have been demanding complete reshuffle of the Ministry and enforcement of the one man one post policy.
The situation is precarious for the party because in the by-elections held last year BJP won both the Assembly seats. BJP, which has been without an MlA for the last 15 years, had also bagged some votes in the local body elections.