An AICC session on January 17 will take a call on the demand to project Rahul Gandhi as the party’s prime ministerial candidate. Party sources said Priyanka Gandhi may also be given some “significant burden” for electioneering along with seniors like Digvijay Singh and Jairam Ramesh.
After the Congress core group meet, which was attended by PM Manmohan Singh and party chief Sonia Gandhi on Monday, AICC general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi said the AICC session has been convened on January 17 to prepare a strategy for the lok Sabha polls.
Emerging from the meeting, Sonia Gandhi ignored questions from the media whether Rahul would be made the party’s prime ministerial candidate at the AICC session. On the day of the Assembly poll results this month, Gandhi had said that the party would announce its PM candidate at an “opportune” time.
Dwivedi dismissed as “illogical” questions that the meet has been called to anoint Gandhi as the PM candidate. He said that the agenda for the AICC meet is decided by the CWC, which also finalises the draft resolutions for the meet.
“Deliberations at AICC meetings are held on the prevailing political situation and on other important issues. The AICC meeting was due since the last meeting was held in Jaipur along with the Chintan Shivir which saw the elevation of Rahul Gandhi as the party’s vice-president,” Dwivedi said.
However, at the AICC official briefing on Monday Congress spokesperson Priya Dutt said, “We would want that Rahul Gandhi should be projected as the PM candidate. There is a consensus amongst the party members, especially the youngsters”.
While several leaders clamoured to make Rahul as the PM nominee and suggested Priyanka too should also be drafted in the campaign work to counter Narendra Modi’s emergence, the party high command wants to develop greater consensus over the issue till Makar Sankranti, after which Congress feels it stars will shine. While BJP had named Modi as PM candidate in September, there has been criticism that Congress has been reticent about naming its nominee.
The core group meet was called at a time when Congress is facing an uphill task and some allies of UPA sending warning signals, the latest being DMK which made it clear that it would not have any alliance with Congress in the lok Sabha polls.
The core group discussed the party’s drubbing in the recent Assembly polls, the rise of AAP and formation of Government in Delhi. Issues like lokpal Bill and desertion by UPA allies also came up for discussion.
While Union Minister Jairam Ramesh is working out the logistics for the lok Sabha polls, Digvijay Singh heads a seven-member communication and publicity team of the sub-group of election strategy committee for the 2014 elections.
Sources said that Priyanka may be given “larger” responsibility to monitor the General Elections War Room of which Union Ministers P Chidambaram, Sushilkumar Shinde, Anand Sharma, Salman Khurshid, party MPs Renuka Chowdhary, Sandeep Dikshit, Ahmed Patel, Janaradan Dwivedi, Madhusudan Mistry, Ambika Soni, Manish Tewari, Deepender Hooda, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Rajeev Shukla and Bhakta Charan Das are members.
Meanwhile, the BJP hit out at the Congress over the speculation of Rahul being anointed as PM candidate, saying that the ruling party has a very limited choice between “deputation” and “dynasty” in this matter.
“Congress has to choose between dynasty and deputation. Right now there is a Prime Minister, who is on deputation. Now they are looking for somebody from the dynasty. They have very limited options”, party vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said. Ridiculing the Congress, another BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu said, “It is their right to select, people have the right to reject”.