Gaurav Gogoi will head the screening committee for Rajasthan with Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot included among the ex-officio members of the panel.
The Congress has decided to hold its public rally against inflation in Jaipur on December 12 after the Delhi Police denied it permission to host the rally in the national capital.
The Congress will begin the Rahul Gandhi-led Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra from the violence-hit Manipur on Sunday, in what is being seen as the party's bid to set the narrative in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls and put the spotlight on issues such as unemployment, price rise and social justice.
A majority of Congress leaders said the party will face desertions if Rahul Gandhi does not remain the leader.
Unlike the LDF and NDA nominees who are at ground zero and campaigning hard every day, the Congress candidate's campaign is undertaken in absentia, dependent on an army of local and imported from the rest of Kerala Congresswomen and men.
Party leaders, sources said, maintained that Congress cannot afford to have a new leader at the helm for rebuilding the organisation at this juncture and that the responsibility for the defeat is collective and not individual.
The Congress would also take inspiration from history as it was from Karnataka that an embattled Indira Gandhi had revived her dwindling political future by winning a Lok Sabha bypoll from Chikmagalur.
He said he will be soon taking a decision on his political future and wants to contest the assembly polls from Kunigal seat.
He said his party will continue to fight the "worst sentiments" the prime minister represents.
Sources said that Congress leaders, including Kamal Nath, Digvijaya Singh, Mukul Wasnik, KC Venugopal, Jairam Ramesh, AK Antony, Ambika Soni and Randeep Surjewala, are also taking part in the meeting at Sonia Gandhi's 10 Janpath residence.
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.
Yashpal Arya and his son, along with their supporters, joined the Congress in the presence of senior party leaders Harish Rawat, K C Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala in New Delhi.
Leaders of several like-minded opposition parties are likely to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Karnataka chief minister-designate Siddaramaiah and deputy chief minister D K Shivakumar on Saturday in Bengaluru.
Gandhi, who is on a whirlwind two-day tour of Kerala as part of Lok Sabha poll campaign and is contesting from Wayanad besides his family bastion Amethi, took time off his hectic schedule to pay obeisance at the famed Thirunelli temple near the stream.
In Karnataka, the BJP lost the elections because of multiple poles of power, a problem the central leadership could not sort out in time. Could the same happen to the Congress in Rajasthan? asks Aditi Phadnis.
Congress leaders will also visit the families of the over 700 farmers who died during the agitation and will organise candle marches and rallies to pray for the departed souls.
In an editorial in party mouthpiece Saamana, the party said that while on the one hand the Bharatiya Janata Party has already started preparing for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress is in dire straits.
What the INDIA alliance needs is neither a counter to Modi's tall personality and undiminished charisma nor a counter-narrative to his Hindutva agenda, now centred on the Ayodhya temple consecration on January 22, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh and Rahul Gandhi read out the Preamble to the Constitution of India as part of the 'Satyagraha of Unity' protest.
While 39 members of the all-important panel are general members, it has 32 permanent invitees, including some in-charges of state and 13 special invitees.
With the tweet, Gandhi also tagged a video of him urging the government to listen to students and take a decision only after reaching a consensus.
Senior Congress leaders Venugopal, Ajay Maken and Ashok Gehlot had on Wednesday took stock of the preparations for the Chintan Shivir.
'There may be some planted stories here or there, people trying to create manufactured controversies but the party is fully united. We will make sure the yatra is even more successful than it has been in other states'
The Karnataka government can have 34 ministers. Ten of them, including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and his deputy D K Shivakumar, were sworn in on May 20.
The discussions are mostly one-on-one, party insiders said on Thursday, a day of many meetings.
The Congress, who has presently become a "leaderless" party, has also been facing multiple shocks at the state levels.
Senior Congress leader and former Union Minister P Chidambaram suffered a fracture in his left rib after he was pushed away by Delhi Police during the party's protest in support of Rahul Gandhi who was summoned by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with the National Herald case, said the party on Monday.
Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on Sunday said he was yet to receive minister T S Singh Deo's resignation from the panchayat department and that he learnt about the latter's move through media.
He expressed confidence he and Pilot would work together after they agreed on a truce before the party high command.
The CPI-M's allegations were termed a political conspiracy by the opposition Congress which accused the Left party of stooping low to target its political opponents.
There is no mention of Kolar, the second seat from where senior party leader and former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, wants to contest, in addition to Varuna, where his name is already cleared.
'Shivakumar is an andhbhakt of Congress ideology and principles.'
Congress leaders and workers were also detained on Wednesday after they staged protests outside the ED office and the party headquarters in New Delhi.
After Congress' observer to the state K C Venugopal made the announcement at a media briefing in New Delhi.
"The meeting was very fruitful and we all are very happy with the outcome. I could not attend the press conference after the conclave as I had to come back to Patna. My effort is to unite all opposition parties ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, and now things are taking shape," the Janata Dal-United leader said.
The Congress leadership is caught in a peculiar situation and wants to find a middle path to the issue, party sources said.
As part of the efforts to bring several opposition parties together on a common platform to defeat the BJP in 2024 Lok Sabha polls, Pawar met Kharge on Thursday evening.
The alliance adopted a resolution to this effect and said its theme for the elections will be "Judega Bharat, Jeetega India, (India will unite, India will win)".
Amid his power tussle with Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Pilot has announced that he will be among the people and Congress workers in various districts of Rajasthan between January 16 and 20.
