October ‘launch’ for Rahul?

Congress chief Sonia Gandhi today set the stage for the formal launch of son Rahul Gandhi in a key party role by scheduling a party plenary ...

Congress chief Sonia Gandhi today set the stage for the formal launch of son Rahul Gandhi in a key party role by scheduling a party plenary session for the third week of October in Hyderabad. The focus of the session will be on Rahul, who is likely to be elected to the Congress Working Committee.

The scheduling of the session was annnounced by general secretary Ambika Soni today after a steering committee meeting at 10 Janpath.

It is expected that Rahul will later be appointed an AICC general secretary on the pattern of his late father Rajiv Gandhi.

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Sonia reportedly feels that Rahul ought to be elected rather than nominated in order to send out the right signals, even though the party constitution provides for the election of 12 CWC members, allowing the party chief to nominate the remaining 11 members.

Party functionaries can be trusted to ensure that Rahul polls the maximum votes of any CWC contestant.

Like his father at the initial stages, Rahul appears to be a reluctant politician even after becoming a Lok SabhaMP from Amethi. Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Salman Khurshid and AICC general secretary Satyavrat Chaturvedi had promised to get him to the state for a roadshow to drum up support for the party, but there is no sign Rahul will oblige.

It took persistent demands by party delegates to get Sonia to summon Rahul to the dais at the last AICC session here. But he stepped off the dais within minutes.

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Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhar Reddy managed to overcome competition from his Maharashtra, Punjab and Haryana counterparts for hosting the plenary session.

Sonia has informed senior colleagues, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, of her decision to hold a Congress Chief Ministers’ conclave in the third week of September. The venue is likely to be Delhi or “even Chandigarh and Dehra Dun”.

While speaking at a Congress Parliamentary Party meeting yesterday, Sonia claimed credit for her party over the passage of the National Rural Employment Gurantee Act. Today, the steering committee heaped the credit on Sonia.

Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee moved a resolution, backed by Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh, saying it was Sonia “who first conceptualised the idea and thereafter converted the idea into the shape of a draft legislation”.