The Congress has tried to ensure representation for leaders cutting across castes, communities, and geographies by appointing Jorhat MP Gaurav Gogoi as its Deputy Leader in the Lok Sabha, Mavelikkara MP K Suresh as Chief Whip, and Virudhnagar MP Manickam Tagore and Kishanganj MP Mohammad Jawed as whips in the Lower House. While Suresh is a Dalit leader from Kerala, Tagore is an OBC leader from Tamil Nadu, and Jawed is a Muslim leader who hails from Bihar. Gogoi, on the other hand, is from Assam and belongs to an Other Backward Class (OBC) community. “It is clear that the party has included leaders from different communities and states intending to give representation to a variety of places, castes, and communities. While Rahul Gandhi, an MP from Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh, is our leader in the Lok Sabha, we have included people to ensure wider representation. The appointments also show that the party walks the talk when it comes to representation of disadvantaged communities,” said a senior Congress MP. All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal announced these appointments on Sunday. Venugopal said Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) chairperson Sonia Gandhi had written to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla to “inform him about the appointments”. “Guided by the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, the Congress and INDIA parties will energetically champion the people’s case in the Lok Sabha,” Venugopal said while congratulating the new appointees. Gaurav Gogoi Son of former Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, 41-year-old Gaurav was the Deputy Leader of the Congress in the previous Lok Sabha too. In the recent Lok Sabha polls, he defeated sitting BJP MP Topon Kumar Gogoi from Jorhat by 1.44 lakh votes. Gogoi shifted to Jorhat after the Kaliabor Lok Sabha constituency, which was his family’s pocket borough and which he represented twice in the past, was transformed in the delimitation exercise last year. Another factor that may have contributed to Gaurav’s shift is the BJP’s aggressive campaign in Kaliabor led by Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma, who is one of his biggest rivals. Gaurav’s appointment is likely to provide an impetus to the party when it raises the Manipur issue on the floor of the House. He is also expected to be the Congress’s voice of the Northeast in the Lower House. K Suresh Since the constitution of the 18th Lok Sabha, Suresh has been in the spotlight. He was at the centre of a controversy after being “overlooked” for the post of pro-tem Speaker despite being the seniormost member of the House. The Congress claimed that BJP MP Bhartruhari Mahtab’s appointment was against “convention”. Suresh, 62, was also the INDIA bloc’s candidate for Lok Sabha Speaker after the government and the Opposition failed to reach a consensus, forcing a rare election for the post. The Congress leader from Kerala is an eight-time MP and has represented the Mavelikkara and the erstwhile Lok Sabha seat of Adoor four times each. He was first elected to the Lower House in 1989 and has retained Mavelikkara since 2009. In the recent polls, he defeated CPI’s young turk C A Arun by 10,000 votes — one of the lowest in the state — in a constituency where the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) holds all seven Assembly segments. He also served as the Union Minister of State for Labour and Employment in the second Manmohan Singh government. Seen as one of the frontrunners for the Kerala Congress chief’s post in 2021, Suresh is currently a special invitee to the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the party’s highest decision-making body, and also serves as the working president of the Congress’s Kerala unit. He has also been an AICC secretary. Manickam Tagore A three-time MP from Virudhnagar in Tamil Nadu, 49-year-old Tagore was the party’s whip in the last Lok Sabha too. In the recent elections, he narrowly defeated V Vijaya Prabhakaran of the DMDK by 4,379 votes. Tagore began his political career with the Congress’ student arm NSUI as a district general secretary and rose through the ranks to hold several key positions in the party. Seen as a Rahul Gandhi confidant, Tagore recently wrote to Birla to accuse Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP’s Hamirpur MP Anurag Thakur of making misleading statements in the House. Mohammad Jawed The 61-year-old Jawed, a four-time MLA and a minister in the Bihar government from 2000 to 2004, contested his first Lok Sabha election from Kishanganj in 2019, defeating the JD(U)’s Syed Mahmood Ashraf. In the recent Lok Sabha elections, he trumped the JD(U)’s Mujahid Alam by more than 59,000 votes. His father Mohammad Hussain Azad has been a six-time MLA and multiple-time minister in Bihar. “Giving a Muslim such a post shows that the party is standing with the minorities of the country. It may also be a way to express gratitude to the people of Kishanganj for electing Congress MPs four consecutive times,” said a leader.
