CWC meet today, deliberate on Lok Sabha debacle; Rahul Gandhi may offer to quit as Congress chief

It is the second successive debacle for the Congress in Lok Sabha elections and Rahul Gandhi had been a prominent face in both the elections.

A meeting of Congress Working Committee (CWC) will be held today at 11 am to look into reasons for the party's debacle in the Lok Sabha elections with party chief Rahul Gandhi expected to give his assessment of what went wrong and the remedial steps that need to be taken. (PTI)

New Delhi: A meeting of Congress Working Committee (CWC) will be held today at 11 am to look into reasons for the party's debacle in the Lok Sabha elections with party chief Rahul Gandhi expected to give his assessment of what went wrong and the remedial steps that need to be taken. Besides, it is believed that Gandhi is likely to offer his resignation today in the meeting after a humiliating defeat in the Lok Sabha polls. It is the second successive debacle for the Congress in Lok Sabha elections and Gandhi had been a prominent face in both the elections. Gandhi lost from the family's pocket borough of Amethi in a shocking defeat that will have implications for the party's revival plans in Uttar Pradesh and his own political standing as a leader. He won from Kerala's Wayanad. Meanwhile, ahead of the meeting, murmurs have already started within the party over taking responsibility for the poor performance of the Congress across the country, with some of its leaders already sending in their resignations. Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Raj Babbar and Odisha Congress president Niranjan Patnaik yesterday announced their resignations from the post in the wake of the party's electoral debacle in their respective states. In the meeting, the top Congress leadership will deliberate on the reasons for the loss and assess them. The party suffered a loss for the second time in a row at the hands of the Narendra Modi led BJP. It bagged only 52 seats in this election - its second lowest tally in its history and is only marginally better than the 44 seats in 2014. The results show that Gandhi, who became party chief in 2017, has not been able to galvanise the party enough to make it a fighting unit against the BJP which has been turned into an election winning machine by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief Amit Shah. Congress suffered in most states and failed to dent the BJP in the Hindi heartland states. The party's poor electoral strategy has allowed BJP to become a dominant force in West Bengal and strengthen itself in Karnataka where it was relatively weak. Gandhi was the prime ministerial candidate of the Congress in the Lok Sabha elections, but he had said that a decision on the leadership will be taken after the elections in consultation with opposition parties. The issues raised by the party included the Rafale fighter jet deal, its promise of a loan waiver and its pitch for providing Rs 72,000 crore to the poorest 20 per cent families in the country. (With inputs from agencies)