Sept. 17: Sonia to be re-elected
Congress chief Sonia Gandhi is all set to be re-elected as party president on September 17. The schedule for the party presidential election was finalised at the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting here on Monday.
As per the schedule, the date for notification of the polls is August 27, last date for filing nominations is September 2, scrutiny will be held on September 3, last date of withdrawal is September 10, and date of polls, if necessary, is September 17. Counting of votes will be held on September 21.
This is also the schedule for the election of the PCC presidents in various states, AICC general secretary Janardan Dwivedi told reporters after the CWC meeting.
PCC delegates, who constitute a total of 7,946, are the electoral collage for the Congress president’s election. Eight PCC delegates one AICC delegates. The number of AICC delegates would be around 1,256.
The Congress president’s election will be in Delhi as also in state headquarters.
Mrs Gandhi, 63, will become the party chief for a record fourth time this time. She has created a record of being the longest-serving party Congress president and completed over a decade since she took over the top post in April 1998. She took over in the wake of the party’s dismal showing in the 1998 Lok Sabha polls that saw the exit of Sitaram Kesri from the post.
She has so far been unanimously elected to the post barring once when Jitendra Prasada, a senior leader from Uttar Pradesh, had thrown his hat in the ring but failed miserably in the polls in 2000.
The election for the party chief’s post is expected to witness Mrs Gandhi’s fourth term for the top office of the party, which is completing 125 years of its inception. This was because no other contender is expected to be in the field. Mrs Gandhi’s re-election is expected to become known on September 2 itself, which is the last date for filing nominations.
Meanwhile, the Congress membership has dwindled substantially, coming down to just over 2.9 crore as against around four crore earlier.
The fall in numbers has been attributed to the party’s strict adherence for photo-identity cards, thereby weeding out bogus members.
The facts about membership were revealed after the CWC meeting here, which finalised the schedule for the party chief’s election.
“The central election authority chairman informed about the ongoing election process. A total of 2 crore 90 lakh 17,894 members were enrolled this year... Last time (previous year) the membership was around 4 crore,” AICC general secretary Janardan Dwivedi told reporters after the meeting.
He said that a total of seven lakh booth committees have been made. The number of PCC delegates will be 7946 and that of AICC members will be 1,256.
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