Senior Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Shashi Tharoor will face-off in an electoral contest on Monday for the post of All India Congress Committee chief, as the party gets set to have a non-Gandhi president in over 24 years.
As per the agenda, the army officials were to brief the panel on recent surgical strikes in terrorist camps in PoK.
Raising the issue when the House met for the day, Derek O'Brien (TMC) said rule 255 was invoked by the Chairman Hamid Ansari on Monday, which his colleague Roy complied with.
Asked about the organisational changes made by Gandhi and the subsequent reported statements by some leaders who had written to her over party reforms, Congress' chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said he had not seen a single statement by any Congress leader on the issue and cannot comment on that.
Rahul has been impressed by the way former Union minister C P Joshi uses the computer to cull out figures and facts.
With the Central Bureau of Investigation holding as "fake" the 2004 encounter of Ishrat Jahan in Gujarat, the Congress on Wednesday launched a scathing attack on Narendra Modi saying "truth speaks for itself from the rooftop" and claimed that the chief minister's role in such encounters will also be exposed.
The Congress' central election authority on Thursday issued a notification for the All India Congress Committee president polls, setting the ball rolling for electing the successor to the longest-serving party chief Sonia Gandhi.
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The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday said that Congress would be "playing with fire" if it uses CBI against Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and his colleagues and such efforts would boomerang badly on them.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari, who is not contesting Lok Sabha polls as he is ailing, has been made acting in-charge of the AICC Communication department along with party spokesman Randeep Surjewala.
No one from the Gandhi family was present at the All India Congress Committee headquarters when the leaders filed their nominations for the election.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has been made the Chairperson of the party's 50-member Campaign Committee for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls in which Rahul Gandhi will be the Co-Chairman, the party announced on Tuesday night.
Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma succeed in convincing Rahul Gandhi of zero returns in blocking Parliament.
Will he, will he not? That is the question on every Congress leader's mind as Rahul Gandhi has still not indicated whether he is ready to take on the mantle of party president.
Congress Vice president Rahul Gandhi's decision to use the same team he used in the Lok Sabha polls for the upcoming assembly elections has not gone down well with many in the party. Rediff.com contributor Renu Mittal reports
There is speculation that the Congress may bring Priyanka Gandhi, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Randeep Surjewala and RPN Singh, among others, to the upper house.
Disappointed and angry Congress members are likely to train their guns on Rahul Gandhi's team of advisors for inept handling of the 2014 Lok Sabha poll campaign, says Rediff.com contributor Anita Katyal
Speculation that whistleblower Indian Administrative Service officer Ashok Khemka may be shifted to the Centre by the Narendra Modi government on Tuesday prompted the Congress to remark that the "association of the Bharatiya Janata Party with many officers and officials is well-known".
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday visited the village of the two Dalit sisters, who were gang-raped and murdered in Badaun, and met their family members as they pressed for a Central Bureau of Investigation probe and refused to take any compensation, demanding justice for their girls.
A day after being reprimanded, Union Steel Minister Beni Prasad Verma on Thursday said he felt "humiliated" and threatened to quit the Congress if he was stopped from "fighting" against Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.
"Rai is a grass root worker, who is a sitting Congress MLA and has fought a number of elections successfully and he will be the best candidate in Varanasi", party spokesman Randeep Surjewala told reporters announcing the candidature.
Opposition members in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday expressed serious concern over reports that some Sangh Parivar leaders had allegedly sought to take "revenge" on the minority community for the killing of a VHP leader.
Political strategist Prashant Kishor, who played a key role in victories of Narendra Modi-led BJP in general elections and the Janata Dal-United-Rashtriya Janata Dal-Congress alliance in Bihar, on Wednesday attended a meeting with Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi to craft the party's strategy for Uttar Pradesh polls.
Hailing the role of self-help groups in advancement of marginalised section of society, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Monday said they provide the poor with "self-confidence to overcome poverty".
Narendra Modi's mother washed utensils to make a living. Madhusudan Mistry's grandmother, who brought him up, was a vegetable vendor. Mistry's trajectory from poverty to membership of the all powerful Congress Working Committee is moving. the man who has Rahul Gandhi's ear and is all set to take on Narendra Modi in Vadodara, speaks to Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt in a fascinating interview.
While Azad, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, has been made in charge of Uttar Pradesh, Nath will look after Punjab and Haryana, party General Secretary Janaradan Dwivedi said.
'If the Congress gets to form the government in 2024, then Sonia Gandhi by virtue of being CPP chairperson will have the authority to decide who will be the prime minister and not Kharge.'
Congress presidential candidate Shashi Tharoor on Tuesday claimed many electors have been instructed by 'their leaders' to support his rival but they may eventually vote for him in a secret ballot.
By filing his nomination as Congress president on Friday, Shashi Tharoor has shown he is no 'quockerwodger' -- a word he introduced into our lexicon which means someone acting on the instructions of an influential third party.
'In some quarters it has been suggested that there will be an 'official candidate' backed by the leadership but on the contrary, it has been repeatedly stressed by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra in my conversations with them over the last two weeks that the Nehru-Gandhi family welcomes these elections'
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will campaign only in Raebareli and Amethi, Congress said on Monday putting at rest speculation about her larger role in electioneering across the country for the Lok Sabha polls.
From the 'group of 23' leaders, who had written letter to Gandhi seeking Congress' overhaul, Azad and Sharma continue to be regular members of the CWC,
The Congress party will have an elected president by June 2021, with the party's working committee on Friday approving holding the internal election after the assembly polls.
'Gehlot is right now doing things, which are not appreciated by the Gandhis.' 'The Gandhis have realised that their writ does not run in Rajasthan, therefore they have deflected the issue to Kharge.'
'The Bharat Jodo Yatra has done very well in the south, and if they are able to pull voters in the south and rely on their allies in the north like in Bihar, UP and do well in Rajasthan, then there are chances that there might be a formidable opposition or at least a force to fight the BJP.'
Office space allotted to its functionaries at the Congress headquarters on 24 Akbar Road has, over the years, emerged as a reliable yardstick to measure a leader's standing in the party hierarchy, says Anita Katyal.
According to party insiders, the revamp will be aimed at serving the dual purposes of fixing accountability for the loss and bringing in a new leadership in the run-up to 2014 polls. The demoralised Congress unit desperately needs a new lease of life, if it has to give any competition to the reenergised Bharatiya Janata Party under Narendra Modi.
The CEOs, sources said, also discussed the steps to raise domestic production of coal.
Union Minister P Chidambaram has opted out of the Lok Sabha election with the party on Thursday night nominating his son Karti from his constituency Sivaganga in Tamil Nadu while another Union Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad was brought as a candidate from Udhampur in Jammu and Kashmir.
Over the past week, Rahul Gandhi has replaced office-bearers in charge of party units in Gujarat and Karnataka and Goa, and brought in young leaders as secretaries. These changes are unlikely to be a one-time exercise and poll-bound states would get the primary attention.
The divide between 'teams' of Congress president Sonia Gandhi's and that of vice president Rahul Gandhi is increasing by leaps and bounds, according to party sources. There appears to be no common ground between the two sides, with both blaming the other for the state of affairs in the party. Renu Mittal reports
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