With more than a year passed of dismal show of the Party in last Assembly elections, Congress Yuvraj Rahul Gandhi finally cracked a whip against all senior leaders of the Party from the State when he reportedly turned down their recommendations send for appointing district presidents of their respective constituencies.
Sources said that Congress MP from Amethi had dismissed the proposal of district and city unit chiefs in 83 out of total 114 posts clearly sending a message that now the time is over for the senior leaders which even included minister
and MPs representing the State to appoint their blue eyed boys on key organization post serving their own interests instead of strengthening the Party.
Sources claimed that leaders like Beni Prasad Verma, Shree Prakash Jaiswal, Salman Khursheed, Jitin Prasad, RPN Singh and almost all the MPs from the State had recommended names of presidents from the respective constituencies but Rahul Gandhi turned them down conveying a strong message that he wanted result oriented district heads and not just who either served their own interest or their respective leaders.
Rahul was reportedly annoyed in the manner in which these so-called leaders mislead him during selection of candidates for last Assembly elections citing winnability factor. The ground reality however, surfaced with outcome of the results when in except one or two seats, the Party lost all the Assembly segments falling under the Parliament constituency of the high-profile leaders.
Sources further confirmed that besides dismissing the proposal of above leaders and asking Nirmal Khatri to look for new faces on remaining 83 seats of district and city unit chiefs, Rahul earlier also shown his anger by removing leaders like Jitin Prasad, RPN Singh, Pl Puniya, Rasheed Masood, Rajarampal, Bijendra Singh, Vivek Singh, and Anugrah Narain Singh from zonal presidents post. He
reportedly threw suggestions made by them in last March for changes at district level organizations falling under their respective zones after finding that they gave `personal’ relations more important than `performance’ of the district level committees chiefs which is totally against the interest of the Party.
Interestingly, Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee chief Nirmal Khatri remained tight-lipped over the issue though he too confirmed that selection by Rahul Gandhi was made purely on performance basis and not that who made the
recommendations. ``Yes, the appointment of 31 district level chiefs has been made on performance basis and similar yard-stick will be applied on remaining 83 posts", confirmed Nirmal Khatri adding that even in his home district Faizabad, the appointment was made by Rahul just as he made recommendation of a new face after analysing his capabilities.
Khatri further confirmed that even all the existing zonal presidents were removed by Rahul just after he (Rahul) found that they failed to do justice as far as strengthening the Organisation probably as they more busy on strengthening their position in their respective constituencies where they will fight next Parliament elections. When asked that why Rahul spared him when he too is set to contest elections from Faizabad, Nirmal Khatri first remained silent but later said that it is better for the AICC to reply on the issue.