Cong setback in Bihar

It was with much fanfare that about a dozen high-profile young MPs and ministers launched the Indian Youth Congresss membership drive in Bihar. AICC general secretary in charge of IYC Rahul Gandhi even made a two-day tour of the state to promote the drive. However,the response has been quite lukewarm. The IYC has been able to enlist less than four lakh members whose forms were found to be bona fide. IYC leaders admit that such drives attracted huge response in states like Tamil Nadu about 1.5 million applicants and Gujarat over 8 lakh because senior Congress leaders played a significant role in enlisting new members. But in Bihar,with AICC in-charge Jagdish Tytler and PCC chief Anil Sharma caught in a bitter war for supremacy,the state leadership had no time for the IYC membership drive,leading to poor response from youngsters. Given that Rahuls two-day trip was a huge success,the final IYC membership figures exposed acute organisational weaknesses in the state where the Congress plans to go it alone in the Assembly elections.