New Delhi, June 4
Stung by a string of electoral reverses and faced with several state and the Lok Sabha polls in the coming months, Congress president Sonia Gandhi today set up a seven-member panel, headed by defence minister A.K. Antony, to suggest ways of revitalising the party organisation.
Union ministers Priyaranjan Dasmunsi and Mani Shankar Aiyar, AICC general secretaries Digvijay Singh and Mukul Wasnik and senior Madhya Pradesh leader Urmilla Singh are the other members of this group. It also includes Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad.
The panel has been asked to submit its report within 15 days. This is in addition to the party’s future challenges group, headed by senior leader M.Veerappa
Moily, which has completed its report on intra-party reforms.
Gulam Nabi Azad’s inclusion on the panel is most significant as it is a clear recognition of his vast organisational skills, which are apparently being missed in the AICC now as the party has been hurtling from one defeat to another.
Azad has led the party to victory in several states as the AICC general secretary. Dasmunsi was only recently given charge of the party’s West Bengal unit and has already made a mark in the recent panchayat elections in the state where the Congress fared quite well.
Digivijay Singh has found a place on the panel primarily because of his experience as the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister and his keen involvement in the recent Karnataka elections. He is currently in charge of Uttar Pradesh and has developed a good rapport with the Nehru-Gandhi scion Rahul Gandhi. Urmilla Singh, who has served as a minister in the Digvijay Singh government, is a Gond tribal from MP and her inclusion is aimed at recovering the Congress’s support base among the tribals, which has eroded over the years.
The constitution of this group follows an announcement to this effect by Congress president Sonia Gandhi at the last Saturday’s meeting of the CWC, where members had expressed serious concern over increasing organisational weaknesses, which were held to have contributed substantially to the string of election defeats suffered by the party in the recent past.
Human resource development minister Arjun Singh had suggested that such a panel be set up to recommend how the party organisation should be strengthened.
Antony, who is heading the group, had chaired a similar panel nearly a decade back with the purpose of re-energising the party organisation. A task force, headed by P. A. Sangma, was also constituted subsequently, again to suggest ways of strengthening the party.
