Acknowledging that the Congress’ connection with people has been “broken”, Rahul Gandhi on Sunday urged party leaders from internal matters to re-establishing the connect through concerted outreach efforts.
To reestablish that connection, party president Sonia Gandhi announced that the party will undertake a Bharat Yatra from October 2 this year. The party also announced a series of organisational reforms at the end of its three-day chintan shivir here to bring new and young faces into leadership roles.
With the three-day brainstorming session coming to an end on Sunday, there were indications that Rahul is likely to return as the Congress president later this year. While Sonia delivered a short speech, Rahul spoke at length.
The party also resolved to usher in a host of organisational reforms, including “one family, one ticket” and fielding those below 50 years of age in half of the seats from 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The Congress’ ‘Chintan Shivir’ concluded with a call for a “Bharat Jodo” (unite India) campaign and party president Sonia Gandhi announced a mass contact programme from Kanyakumari to Kashmir starting October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, to reach out at the grassroots. She said senior leaders like her will also participate in the yatra.
The party adopted the “Nav Sankalp” declaration in which it decided to herald path-breaking changes like putting a cap of five years on leaders holding a particular post, allocating 50 percent of the posts in the organisation to those below 50 years of age and calling for fixing of retirement age for those in Parliament, state legislatures and other elected posts.
The decision to bank on youth comes after a prolonged old-versus-new tussle and a series of exits of young leaders from the Congress in recent years that had been attributed to the party’s old guard failing to address the aspirations of the so-called ‘gen-next’ leaders.
The reforms that are aimed at helping reboot the Congress and making it battle-ready for upcoming elections, come in the wake of the series of electoral reverses for the party in the last eight years after it was ousted from power in 2014.
However, the party has added a caveat to the ‘one family, one ticket’ formula stating that if another member in one’s family is politically active, then only after five years of organisational experience that person should be considered eligible for a Congress ticket.
The Congress also said it was committed to establishing a dialogue with all like-minded parties to protect the spirit of nationalism and democracy and would keep open avenues for forging alliances according to political circumstances.
In his concluding remarks, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi acknowledged that the Congress’ connection with people has been “broken” and urged leaders to shift focus from internal matters and re-establish the connect with the public, saying there are no shortcuts and it can be achieved only through hard work and by the sweat of their brow.
Sonia Gandhi also announced the setting up of a task force to implement the reforms and an advisory committee of CWC members headed by her to deliberate on political issues, while making it clear that it will not be a collective decision-making body.
Her assertion assumes significance as the G-23 dissident leaders had made a persistent call for “collective leadership” in the party while demanding an organisational overhaul.