'What matters is policies, not personalities like Priyanka, Rahul or Modi.'
Senior Congress leader M Mallikarjun Kharge is not averse to running for the AICC president's election if party chief Sonia Gandhi asks him to contest, sources close to the veteran leader said on Wednesday.
Expressing surprise over Congress fielding a second candidate 'all of a sudden', senior JD-S leader and former Minister H D Revanna requested the national party for support to keep the 'communal forces' out of the race.
As Congress president Sonia Gandhi appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED), party MPs and Congress Working Committee (CWC) members 'courted mass arrest' outside the All India Congress Committee headquarters in New Delhi on Thursday in a show of collective solidarity with her.
Amit Shah seemingly encouraging AIADMK dissident Sengottaiyan after party boss Edappadi K Palaniswami had removed his one-time mentor from all party posts has not gone down well with party cadres. They are now ready to buy Team EPS' theory that the BJP and Amit Shah are out to liquidate the AIADMK, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has convened a meeting of party general secretaries and state in-charges on March 26 to discuss organisational elections, the party's membership drive and the current political situation besides planning agitational programmes.
With party observers slamming some actions of loyalists of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, sources said decision on issuing show cause notices to miffed MLAs, who have been vocal in public, will be taken after interim chief looks Sonia Gandhi into the report by the observers sent to the state.
Just before the Congress Working Committee meeting is scheduled to be held on Monday, an internal dispute had emerged regarding "leadership" issues in the party.
The meetings come days after an open rebellion by Gehlot loyalists over a possible leadership change in the state, clouding Gehlot's chances of running for the presidency.
Sharma was the key person who looked after Rae Bareli and Amethi constituencies on behalf of the Gandhis.
The issues listed by Gandhi include Centre-state relations, rise in cases of communal tension, border transgressions by China and the demand for a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) to investigate the transactions of the Adani business group in light of several revelations.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday wrote to the Enforcement Directorate seeking postponement of her appearance by a few weeks till she recovers completely from Covid and a lung infection.
President Droupadi Murmu, Prime Minister Narendra D Modi, senior Cabinet ministers, Congress and Opposition leaders paid their respects to former prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh, who passed into the ages on Thursday night, at his residence in New Delhi on Friday.
The deputy chief minister, he told his voters that their desire (to see him as chief minister) will never be false, and asked them to wait with patience.
K Natwar Singh wore many hats as he straddled the worlds of diplomacy, politics and writing but what remained consistent across decades was his sharp-wit and plainspeaking.
Former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and chief ministers of Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan, Punjab and Chhattisgarh are among those named by the party as its star campaigners in Uttar Pradesh.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has tested positive for COVID-19 and she has isolated herself under medical advice, party chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said on Thursday.
Ending days of suspense, the Congress on Friday announced that Rahul Gandhi will contest the Lok Sabha elections from Rae Bareli, the constituency held by his mother Sonia Gandhi for the last two decades, and Kishori Lal Sharma, a close aide of the Gandhi family, will fight from Amethi.
The opposition party was reacting after BJP spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia asked Ansari and the Congress to come clean on the claims of Pakistani journalist Nusrat Mirza that he had visited India five times during the Congress-led UPA rule and passed on sensitive information collected here to his country's spy agency ISI.
'Politics is a game of public perception and my father felt that by his long disappearances, Rahul Gandhi was losing the battle of perception.'
The BJP has demanded the death penalty for former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots. The party's leaders have called for the CBI to appeal the verdict, saying it was not an ordinary murder case but a genocide. The BJP has also said that the "wheels of justice" are starting to turn and that other Congress leaders involved in the riots will soon face consequences.
The sources said some leaders may be attached to her to decrease her workload. With the CWC meeting held in the backdrop of the letter of 20 party leaders to Sonia Gandhi which raised some heckles, several leaders expressed their views in the meeting lasted for over seven hours.
Union minister for Women and Child Development Maneka Gandhi asked officials in her Lok Sabha constituency of Pilibhit to follow the example of Sonia in order to check corruption in the education department.
She also proposed that nine issues, including violence in Manipur and price rise, be listed for discussion during the session.
Kishore said the Congress and its supporters are bigger than any individual and Gandhi should not be stubborn that it must be him who will deliver for the party despite repeated failures.
Rahul Gandhi would be pursued to return as Congress president as there is none in the party other than him who has a pan-India appeal, veteran leader M Mallikarjun Kharge has said.
First look on remembering Rajiv Gandhi.
The interim panel headed by him would take the place of the Congress Working Committee, the apex decision-making body, till a new CWC is formed after Kharge's election is ratified at the party plenary.
NCP supremo Sharad Pawar had asked Rahul Gandhi to tone down the criticism of Savarkar and reminded the Congress leader that the real fight of the opposition parties was with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP.
Gandhi made the demand during her brief conversation with the prime minister in the Lok Sabha on the first day of the Monsoon session Just before the House met for the day, Modi took a round to greet various leaders.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra would participate in the Karnataka leg of the "Bharat Jodo Yatra" led by Rahul Gandhi that will be entering the state on September 30, state party chief D K Shivakumar said on Friday.
To chart the Congress's future course, its chief Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday formed three groups -- on political affairs for guidance on key issues, task force-2024 to implement the Udaipur 'Nav Sankalp' declaration, and another to coordinate the October 2 'harat Jodo Yatra.
Small gestures from Indira gave Sonia the confidence that she could be a daughter-in-law in the distinguished family.
After the party's drubbing in the just-concluded assembly polls in five states, Congress president Sonia Gandhi has asked its state unit chiefs in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Goa, Punjab and Manipur to put in their papers.
The meeting of Congress's highest decision-making body is expected to be at a very 'high voltage' as Sonia's resignation will not be accepted by the CWC members.
The Congress, referring to Gandhi's speech at a campaign rally at Hubballi on Saturday, said in a tweet that the Congress Parliamentary Party Chairperson "sends a strong message to 6.5 crore Kannadigas,' and also posted pictures of her speaking at the public meeting.
Gandhi was unusually more proactive and practically led the Opposition protest against the rise in the prices of petrol, diesel and LPG cylinders during the Question Hour.
Gandhi was put in a police bus but officials did not disclose where he was being taken.
The launch coincides with the birthday of Congress Parliamentary Party Chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
Gandhi, then a newly appointed Congress chief, had staked claim to form the government at the Centre after the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had lost the vote of confidence in the Lok Sabha on April 17, 1999.
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