Rahul meets Pilot, Gehlot; all eyes on future plans

A day after shunning any meeting with party leaders, Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday met senior party leaders including Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, his deputy Sachin Pilot.

Rahul, who had offered to quit as Congress President owning up responsibility for the party's Lok Sabha debacle, had refused to meet party leaders signalling that he was adamant on relinquishing the top post.

AICC General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Congress chief spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala were among the first visitors to Rahul on Tuesday amid talk of large-scale changes in the party organisation, including that in the Congress Working Committee (CWC).

Rahul has been incensed at certain senior leaders including Gehlot and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath, who pitched for Lok Sabha tickets for their sons, ignoring claims of party workers.

AICC General Secretary Jyotiraditya Scindia, who lost the Lok Sabha polls from his family bastion Guna, also met the Congress President.

On Saturday, the CWC had authorised Rahul to carry out a “complete overhaul and detailed restructuring” of the party at every level after the humiliating loss in the Lok Sabha polls that saw it winning 52 seats – eight seats more that its worst ever performance of 44 seats in the 2014 general elections.

Rahul is learnt to have told party leaders that he would like to step down from the top party post and work to fight the ideological battle against the BJP.

The turn of fortunes of the Congress in Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka had put the state governments in jeopardy. The Congress-led government in Madhya Pradesh has a slender majority. The independent legislators and BSP members supporting it were having second thoughts on continuing with their support.

In Karnataka, there is unrest within the Congress-JD(S) coalition ranks after its poor performance in the state, prompting the Congress to send AICC General Secretaries K C Venugopal and Ghulam Nabi Azad to the state for firefighting.