New Delhi : Former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda (69) is tipped to be appointed as an AICC general secretary and likely to be given charge of Rajasthan as a part of strategy to revamp the party with key slots opening up for senior and experienced party leaders in a staggered reshuffle.
Congress wants to engage Hooda, a Jat leader, in Rajasthan as the party does not have any prominent Jat leader since the demise of former Union minister Sis Ram Ola who passed away in December 2013 at the age of 86, party sources said.
Those being considered for important positions in the Congress include former Union home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde (75), former Delhi CM Sheila Dikshit (79), and former Union ministers Kishore Chandra Deo (70) and M Veerappa Moily (77).
AICC general secretary Kamal Nath (70), the senior most Lok Sabha member elected from Chhindwara for the ninth term, is tipped to be sent to Madhya Pradesh as the state party president in place of Arun Yadav, to prepare the party for the Assembly elections next year-end. There is, however, no clarity yet whether he would be projected as the CM or Rahul Gandhi would prefer his close friend and MP Jyotiraditya Scindia (43) for the plum post.
Party sources said Ambika Soni (74) has requested Sonia Gandhi to reduce her workload citing inability to travel frequently. Besides running the Congress President’s office, she is also the general secretary in-charge of poll-bound Himachal Pradesh as well as Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir.
The party sources say Hooda is a natural choice as the general secretary after remaining chief minister for 10 years but insiders say he is being brought to Delhi to stop the regular bickering he is having with Haryana PCC president Ashok Tanwar (41), a Rahul Gandhi protégé. Appointment of former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot (62) as the AICC general secretary in-charge of Gujarat is also seen as preventing him from giving pinpricks to PCC President Sachin Pilot (39), another Rahul protégé.
Even Ashok Tanwar, a Dalit, is tipped to be replaced with someone who can restore unity within the Haryana unit. It is not yet decided whether his replacement will be a Jat or a non-Jat leader. Hooda does not want to head the PCC but he wants to be kept on board in deciding the changes in the state in view of the strong hold he has both over the organisation and the legislature party.
The reshuffle in phases that began with the appointment of Gehlot also saw Kerala MP K C Venugopal (54) replacing veteran Digvijaya Singh (70) as the AICC general secretary in-charge of Karnataka last week.
Maken recalls resignation
Delhi Congress chief Ajay Maken on Wednesday said he has withdrawn his resignation that he had submitted to party President Sonia Gandhi after the Congress’ “unsatisfactory performance” in the recent Delhi civic polls.
