Newly-elected Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday formed a steering committee with 47 members of the party, intended to function in place of the Congress Working Committee.
The prominent names on the list included those of Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Manmohan Singh. It is supposed to work in-stead of the CWC, the highest decision-making body of the party and will function till the plenary session is held.
The members of the Congress Working Committee stepped down this morning as a part of the convention when a new chief is elected, so that he or she can choose their own team. New members of the Working Committee will be chosen at the next AICC session.
All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Organisation, K C Venugopal said, “All the CWC members, AICC general secretaries and in-charges have tendered their resignation to Congress president.”
All the office bearers including general secretaries and in-charges have been included in the steering committee.
Meanwhile, Kharge has maintained that he believes in collective leadership and will consult with Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi if and when required.
He had said, “They have done good for this country. Their advice will benefit the party... so I will definitely seek their advice and support. There is no shame in it.”
Kharge, who was elected after an election was held, over his party colleague and senior leader Shashi Tharoor, had said that he would implement the Udaipur Declaration and address the problems of the youth, farmers, women and small traders.
Following multiple calls for change, internal elections were held in the party and Kharge was a late entry after Rajasthan Chief Minister and veteran Congress leader Ashok Gehlot dropped out of the race.
The other members including senior party leaders included in the steering committee are, A.K. Antony, Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Ajay Maken, Ambika Soni, Anand Sharma, Gaikhangam, Avinash Pande, Harish Rawat, Jairam Ramesh, Jitendra Singh, Kum. Selja, K.C. Venugopal, Lalthanhawla, Mukul Wasnik, Oommen Chandy, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, P Chidambaram, Randeep S Surjewala, Raghubeer Meena, Tariq Anwar, Dr. A. Chella Kumar, Dr. Ajoy Kumar, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Bhakta Charan Das, Devendra Yadav, Digvijaya Singh, Dinesh Gundu Rao, Harish Chaudhary, H.K. Patil, Jai Prakash Agarwal, K.H. Muniyappa, B. Manickam Tagore, Manish Chatrath, Meira Kumar, P.L. Punia, Pawan Kumar Bansal, Pramod Tiwari, Rajani Patil, Dr. Raghu Sharma, Rajeev Shukla, Salman Khurshid, Shaktisinh Gohil, T Subbirami Reddy and Tariq Hamid Karral.
