Major reshuffle in Congress Top Level

New Delhi: In a major reshuffle of the party, Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Friday removed Ghulam Nabi Azad, Motilal Vora, Ambika Soni, Mallikarjun Kharge as AICC general secretaries, and reconstituted CWC and appointed P Chidambaram, Randeep Surjewala, Tariq Anwar and Jitendra Singh as its regular members.

Gandhi also removed Luizinho Faleiro as AICC general secretaries and formed a special committee to assist her in party matters.

The new members in the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the party’s highest decision-making body, will replace Faleiro, Vora, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Tamradhwaj Sahu.

The six-member special committee, formed to assist her in organisational and operational matters, will have AK Antony, Ahmed Patel, Ambika Soni, KC Venugopal, Mukul Wasnik and Randeep Surjewala as its members. Surjewala has also been made the general secretary in-charge for Congress affairs in Karnataka.

From the ‘group of 23′ leaders, who had written a letter to Gandhi seeking Congress’ overhaul, Azad and Sharma continue to be regular members of the CWC, while Jitin Prasada has been made a permanent invitee to CWC from being a special invitee earlier. Prasada has also been made in-charge of party affairs in West Bengal.

Wasnik, another leader who was among the ‘letter-writers’, has been made AICC general secretary incharge for Madhya Pradesh. Lovely, also from the ‘group of 23’ has been accommodated as a member of the CEA.

Anugrah Narayan Singh, Asha Kumari, Gaurav Gogoi and Ram Chandra Khuntia are among those dropped by the Congress as its incharge for states.

There is no change in the role of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra who will now be the AICC general secretary incharge for Uttar Pradesh. She was earlier general secretary for Uttar Pradesh East, but was practically taking care of the entire state after Jyotiraditya Scindia, who was general secretary for Uttar Pradesh (West), quit and joined the BJP.

The new AICC general secretaries include Harish Rawat for Punjab, Oomen Chandy for Andhra Pradesh, Tariq Anwar for Kerala and Lakshadweep, Jitendra Singh for Assam, Maken for Rajasthan and KC Vengopal for Organisation.

While Bansal has been made incharge of AICC administration, those who will look after state affairs include Rajni Patil (Jammu and Kashmir), PL Punia (Chhattisgarh), RPN Singh (Jharkhand), Shaktisinh Gohil (Delhi and Bihar), Rajeev Shankarrao Satav (Gujarat, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu) and Rajeev Shukla (Himachal Pradesh).

Others include Dinesh Gundu Rao (Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Goa), Manickam Tagore (Telangana), Chellakumar (Odisha), HK Patil (Maharashtra), Devender Yadav (Uttarakhand), Vivek Bansal (Haryana), Manish Chatrath (Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya), Bhakta Charan Das (Mizoram and Manipur) and Kuljit Singh Nagra (Sikkim, Nagaland and Tripura).

“The party wholeheartedly appreciates the contributions of outgoing general secretaries Azad, Vora, Soni, Kharge and Faleiro,” a statement by AICC general secretary Venugopal said.

It also appreciates the contributions of outgoing in-charges Anugrah Narayan Singh, Asha Kumari, Gaurav Gogoi and Ram Chandra Khuntia, it added.

(PTI)