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Have taken decision on Congress chief post, will be clear after polls: Rahul Gandhi
Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday said he had decided on his stand with respect to the party president’s post but refused to elaborate saying it would become clear after the internal elections are held.
Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday said he had decided on his stand with respect to the party president’s post but refused to elaborate saying it would become clear after the internal elections are held.
Speaking on the second day of the party’s 3,570-km Bharat Jodo Yatra, Gandhi said his participation in the yatra was not a contradiction to his silence on the issue of the party president’s post.
Speaking to reporters in Kanyakumari, Gandhi said, “Whether I become the president or don’t, this will become very clear when the presidential election takes place in the Congress. It will become clear. So, wait till that time. I have clearly decided in my mind what I am going to do. There is no confusion in my mind at all.”
He had resigned from the top post after the party received a drubbing in the 2019 general elections. His mother Sonia Gandhi is serving in the top post currently.
Nominations for the Congress president’s election will be open from September 24 and will close on September 30, and in case of a contest, elections are set to be held on October 17 with the counting two days later.
A string of leaders have quit the party over the past two years including Ghulam Nabi Azad and Kapil Sibal.
Asked about high profile leaders exiting the party, Gandhi said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had better ways of “putting pressure” than he did.
“You know the role of the CBI, ED and Income Tax department. You know how they deal with these things. So we are not fighting a political party anymore, We used to fight a political party. Now, the fight is between the structure of the Indian state and the Opposition,” he said.
Gandhi said he hoped to get an “understanding about himself and this beautiful country” through the yatra, which will involve walking 3,570 kilometres through 12 states.
The yatra started from Kanyakumari and is scheduled to end in Kashmir in 150 days.
“In these two-three months, I will be wiser… For us in the Congress, this is a journey and an attempt at understanding what is going on in India and an attempt at undoing the damage done by BJP and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS),” he said.
Hitting out at Gandhi’s remarks, BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla said: “Rahul Gandhi must first stop Hypocrisy. The country was burning because of riots during the Congress regime. Massacres kept happening in which thousands of people died. Instead of acting on those scenes of massacre and death, statements were given that when a big tree falls, the earth shakes.”
