Youth wing to lead Cong revival

Poll battered Congress is again looking at its youth to lead the party’s revival, with the Indian Youth Congress set to kick off formal discussions on recoup this Friday (December 5). Poll battered Congress is again looking at its youth to lead the party’s revival, with the Indian Youth Congress set to kick off formal discussions on recoup this Friday (December 5).

Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 1

Poll battered Congress is again looking at its youth to lead the party’s revival, with the Indian Youth Congress set to kick off formal discussions on recoup this Friday (December 5).

The meeting, which IYC organisers are calling “Caravan”, seeks to prepare a short and long term strategy for Congress’ rejuvenation after its worst ever Lok Sabha polls defeat this May. The party scored the lowest 44 seats in the General Election and later lost power in Maharashtra and Haryana.

After long, the IYC event will bring together on one platform all past national presidents of the organisation, former general secretaries and incumbent state IYC chiefs to dialogue on ways of infusing life into demoralised party cadres.

Present at the discussions will be Congress president Sonia Gandhi, party vice president Rahul Gandhi and top past IYC Presidents from Ambika Soni, Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma to Mukul Wasnik, Randeep Surjewala and Ashok Tanwar. Past Congress general secretaries in charge of IYC including Ahmed Patel, current Political Secretary to Sonia Gandhi, will also be there.

The event is the first formal engagement the Congress is holding on its revival since losing power at the Centre to Narendra Modi-led BJP. It is indicative of the fact that the party is once again reposing faith in its youth leadership to rebuild the organisation which many admit “has gone haywire”.

IYC president Rajeev Satav told The Tribune, “Even after the 1977 defeat, The Indian Youth Congress had led the Congress’ revival. The youth of the party are waiting to hear from veterans how best to go forward rebuilding the cadres.”

Invites for the gathering have gone out to 400 people including all former national office bearers of the IYC. Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi, the oldest surviving IYC president is on the invited list but he won’t come being indisposed physically.

The Tribune has learnt that the national IYC meeting chaired by Sonia will be followed in January next year by a meeting of all 10,000 elected office-bearers of the organisation which Rahul personally is in charge of. Overall membership of the IYC is 90 lakh and it faces a severe competition from BJP’s youth wing.

Congress insiders feel the event is also IYC’s way of showing that it is not as defunct as thought. After the party’s LS defeat, the IYC had come in for severe criticism from veterans who blamed it for being invisible on the ground. “December 5 will mark a beginning of IYC’s struggle to reconnect with the masses,” Satav acknowledged.