New Delhi, February 10
The Congress on Monday appointed young sitting Lok Sabha MP from Sirsa Ashok Tanwar as president of its Haryana unit.

Tanwar (38) replaces 73-year-old Phool Chand Mullana, a Dalit leader, who had been the state Congress chief since 2007.

Mullana continued to be the working president despite losing the 2009 Assembly elections after the Congress high command declined to accept his resignation. The appointment of a full time Haryana Congress chief has been pending since then.

Tanwar, a former president of the Indian Youth Congress (from 2005 to 2010), now faces the uphill task of uniting the faction-ridden Haryana Congress ahead of Lok Sabha and assembly polls later this year and constituting the long-defunct Pradesh Congress committee in the state.

Tanwar appointmen is considered politically significant in Haryana where open dissent between two powerful political camps – one led by Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and the other by Rajya Sabha MPs Kumari Selja and Birider Singh – has hurt the image of the party. Tanwar is seen as a neutral appointee, someone close to Rahul Gandhi who recently handpicked him to speak at the AICC Session in January.

Tanwar’s elevation comes close on the heels of Rahul’s meeting with Haryana Congress leaders on January 19 where he told them that all factions would have to be taken along. “The message to state leaders is clear – everyone will have to stand united and everyone will have to be taken along,” a senior Congress leader said today. Tanwar, being Rahul’s appointee, is expected to be acceptable to both factions in Haryana though he will face the challenge of being an outsider. Mainly confined to national politics, Tanwar won LS elections for the first time from Sirsa in 2009.

This major organisation change in Haryana is part of the recent overhauling of the state unit which started when the team comprising Congress general secretary Shakeel Ahmed and Congress secretary Asha Kumari assumed charge of the state. The duo played a role in reporting ground feedback to the Congress president.

The Tribune had reported in September last that Tanwar was a frontrunner for Haryana Congress president’s post. Changes had become palpable after Birinder Singh’s Jind rally in August 2013 where Sonia had deputed Congress general secretary Sigvijay Singh as her nominee.

All this while, consensus was being evolved on Tanwar, a top source said, adding that in principle the decision had been taken a long time ago hoping it would balance out rival camps in Haryana where the Congress faces both the BJP-HJC and AAP challenge this time in the General Election.

Tanwar, a Dalit as Mullana, is married to Avantika Maken, granddaughter of former President Shankar Dayal Sharma, and will be projected as a Dalit-Brahmin face in the state. Being “no one’s man”, he would wield the power to democratise Haryana Congress on the lines of Rahul’s overall organisational strategy.