Congress Leadership Crisis: Sonia Gandhi Likely To Step Down As Party's Interim President On Monday After Letter Row

A meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) scheduled on Monday August 24, has reportedly been called to discuss the organisational issues pointed out by Congress leaders in the letter.

Photo: File/PTI

The internal tussle in the grand old party appears to have intensified to a heated level as Sonia Gandhi is likely to step down from her post of Congress Interim President during an internal meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) on Monday. The move seems to be a response to the letter signed by more than 20 top leaders of the party seeking "full-time" leadership in Congress. As per the several media reports, Sonia Gandhi has replied to the letter saying that her stint as interim president for one year is complete and she would like step down from the post. A meeting of the Congress Working Committee is scheduled on Monday, August 24. The meeting has reportedly been called to discuss the organisational issues pointed out by Congress leaders. As may as 23 senior Congress leaders, including five former chief ministers, sitting MPs Shashi Tharoor and Manish Tiwari, members of Congress Working Committee and over a dozen former union ministers, have written a letter to party chief Sonia Gandhi, asking her to make "sweeping changes" in the party and stop its "steady decline." The senior party leaders have said they are unhappy with "uncertainty" and "drift" in the party. The letter calls for an "honest introspection", "collective leadership", and stresses that the "youth are losing confidence" in the party. The signatories to the letter include party MPs and former Union Ministers Anand Sharma, Kapil Sibal, Manish Tewari, Shashi Tharoor, MP Vivek Tankha, AICC and CWC members Jitin Prasada and Mukul Wasnik, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad, former chief ministers and union ministers Bhupinder Singh Hooda, M Veerappa Moily, Rajender Kaur Bhattal, Prithviraj Chavan, P J Kurian, Renuka Chaudhary, and Milind Deora; former PCC chiefs Raj Babbar (UP), Arvinder Singh Lovely (Delhi) and Kaul Singh Thakur (Himachal); current Bihar campaign chief Akhilesh Prasad Singh, former Haryana Speaker Kuldeep Sharma; former Delhi Speaker Yoganand Shastri and former MP Sandeep Dixit.