Senior leaders have urged Rahul Gandhi to assume Congress’s leadership again even as the Congress Working Committee (CWC) on Sunday announced the election for the party’s president will be held on October 17.
“I have my personal opinion and it is the feeling of all the workers that Rahul Gandhi should take the lead of the Congress at this time… He is the only one who can lift the Congress. He can unify and strengthen the party,” said Mallikarjun Kharge, the Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha.
Other leaders such as Salman Khurshid and Ashok Gehlot have echoed Kharge. “Rahul Gandhi remains number one and the only choice of Congress rank and file to take over as the party chief,” said Khurshid.
Former Uttarakhand chief minister Harish Rawat said that party workers “hope and request” Gandhi to accept the post.
Gehlot said if Rahul Gandhi does not become the party president, it will be a disappointment. “He should understand the sentiments of party workers and accept the post.”
On Sunday, the CWC announced the schedule for polling for the Congress president’s election amid speculation that the Gandhi family could step aside to make way for a non-Gandhi chief of the party. The final schedule of the election was pushed back by nearly a month from the original plan.