Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday has 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 ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’.
The move is seen as step to revive the party whose political fortunes have plummeted in recent times with series of assembly elections losses and even losing base to regional parties like AAP.
Congress today shares power with DMK in Tamil Nadu, with Shiv Sena, NCP in Maharashtra and JMM in Jharkhand . It has two states like AAP’s – Delhi, Punjab in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.
While Rahul Gandhi and two prominent members of the G23 — Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma — are part of the political affairs group, senior leaders P Chidambaram and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra are members of the Task Force-2024.
Sonia Gandhi has also set up another group to coordinate the ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ planned from Kanyakumari to Kashmir from Gandhi Jayanti.
The Political Affairs Group, headed by Sonia Gandhi, comprises Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni, Digvijaya Singh, Anand Sharma, K C Venugopal and Jitendra Singh.
The members of the Task Force-2024 are P Chidambaram, Mukul Wasnik, Jairam Ramesh, K C Venugopal, Ajay Maken, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Randeep Singh Surjewala and Sunil Kanugolu.
The Central Planning Group for the Coordination of the ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ includes Digvijaya Singh, Sachin Pilot, Shashi Tharoor, Ravneet Singh Bittu, K J George, Jothi Mani, Pradyut Bordoloi, Jitu Patwari and Saleem Ahmed.
“Each member of the Task Force shall be assigned specific tasks related to organization, communications and media, outreach, finance and election Management.
“They shall have designated teams which will be notified subsequently,” the statement said, adding the Task Force will also follow up on the Udaipur Nav Sankalp declaration.