Digvijay Singh, Sushil Kumar Sindhe dropped in Rahul Gandhi's new Congress working committee; first meeting likely on 22 July
Digvijay Singh, Sushil Kumar Sindhe dropped in Rahul Gandhi's new Congress working committee; first meeting likely on 22 July
Congress chief Rahul Gandhi constituted new Congress Working Committee (CWC), the highest decision-making body of the grand old party and dissolved the old CWC on Tuesday. Mr Gandhi constituted a new Congress Working Committee, bringing in some new faces, and dropping some old and veteran faces. The new CWC constituted the first time under the presidency of Rahul Gandhi, has 23 members, 18 permanent invitees and 10 special invitees. According to reports, the Congress president has convened the first meeting of the CWC on July 22.
In the new Congress Working Committee, former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister and Senior Congress leaders Digvijaya Singh, Kamal Nath, Sushil Kumar Shinde, Mohan Prakash and CP Joshi in addition to Janardan Dwivedi have been dropped by party chief Rahul Gandhi. Speaking on formulating the new Congress Working Committee, some party insiders have said that this shows Rahul Gandhi’s intent to bring in young talent into the party and also shows that he wants some veterans to maintain the roots of the grand old party who can lead the way for the new inductees.
The members of the newly constituted CWC are – party president Rahul Gandhi, former party president Sonia Gandhi, ex-prime minister Manmohan Singh, Motilal Vora, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Mallikarjun Kharge, AK Antony, Ahmed Patel, Ambika Soni, Oommen Chandy, Tarun Gogoi, Siddaramaiah, Anand Sharma, Harish Rawat, Kumari Selja, Mukul Wasnik, Avinash Pande, KC Venugopal, Dipak Babaria, Tamradhwaj Sahu, Raghuveer Meena, Gaikhangam and Ashok Gehlot.
Among the permanent invitees to the CWC are former Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit, former Union minister P Chidambaram, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Balasaheb Thorat, Tariq Hameed Karra, PC Chacko, Jitendra Singh, RPN Singh, PL Punia, Ranjeep Surjewala, Asha Kumari, Rajni Patil, Ram Chandra Khuntia, Anugrah Narayan Singh, Rajeev S Satav, Shaktisinh Gohil, Gaurav Gogoi and A Chella Kumar.
The 10 special invitees include KH Muniyappa, Arun Yadav, Deepender Hooda, Jitin Prasada, Kuldeep Vishnoi. The list also includes some office bearers of the Congress party – president of Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC), president of Indian Youth Congress (IYC), president of National Students Union of India (NSUI), president of All India Mahila Congress, and chief organiser of Congress Seva Dal.