New Delhi: The Congress is yet to implement many of the key decisions taken at its Navsankalp Shivir at Udaipur held 10 months ago, including the creation of two panels for elections and public feedback, and a training institute for party workers.
A senior Congress leader said that it is possible that “the panels will be formed after the AICC plenary”. The Congress plenary is scheduled from February 24 in Raipur.
The panel on elections was considered especially important for a party that has lost a series of polls since 2019, and which has also seen a significant erosion of its ranks with several leaders and workers defecting to the Bharatiya Janata Party or other parties.
The party has been stressing on the need for an ideological reboot and an improvement in feedback mechanism to have a more effective ear on the ground.
On April 15 last year, the Congress announced major changes in the organisation with the setting up of an Election Management Department (a key suggestion of pollster Prashant Kishor) to fight polls more efficiently and a task force to drive the process of internal reforms.
The Congress also announced that it would create a Public Feedback Department to provide “rational feedback” on various issues for policy making, and a National Training Institute for extensive training of party leaders and workers.
The party also announced the Bharat Jodo Yatra—India’s longest padyatra—that successfully ended on January 30 in Srinagar.
Since the Udaipur session, the party has elected a new president, restructured some departments, including communication, inducted Kishor’s former aide Sunil Kanugolu to look into election management and appointed four coordinators in Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s office to handle myriad responsibilities — but it is yet to form the panels.
For the past five months, the party has focused on the Bharat Jodo Yatra and the election of a new President (Mallikarjun Kharge was elected to the post in October), but the all-important panel on election management is still in the works even as the 2024 general election is barely a year away.
The panel is likely to include party president, Rahul Gandhi and a few top-ranking leaders. Party functionaries said that Sunil Kanugoluhas already started handling the election affairs.
The national training institute will be set up in Kerala by converting an existing organisation, the functionaries added.