Congress grapples with ‘inactive’ observers

The Congress has found that about two-fifths of its observers have been inactive in performing the role assigned to them across the 15 Assembly constituencies that are facing bypolls.

The Congress had named 253 leaders - former ministers, ex-legislators and seniors - and it seems not all of them are working as expected.

According to sources, these observers were tasked with the responsibility of mobilising grassroots support for the party, chalking out caste-wise strategies and so on.

“Each observer has been given the responsibility of overseeing the party’s activities in a village, a gram panchayat, taluk panchayat or a zilla panchayat (in case of a senior leader). But we find that 40% of them aren’t working. Instead, they’re just giving the candidate more work,” a source said.