It is learnt that the newly-appointed AICC in-charge of Haryana BK Hariprasad has convened a meeting on March 6 in Delhi which, besides reviving dialogues of the stake-holders after the party’s poll loss, will attempt to “start the process of” addressing long-pending vested issues, including naming the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader of Haryana (who will be the Opposition leader in the assembly), electing a new state Congress president and lining up the party’s district presidents in a state where the key party posts and committees are lying vacant for years now.
All that the party leadership did after the Haryana defeat was hold a preliminary review of the results by some AICC functionaries last October and then constituting a panel to probe alleged tampering of the electoral process.
While the AICC has now timed the March 6 meeting with the conclusion of the municipal polls in the state, incidentally, it also came after the central leadership recently shunted out previous in-charge Deepak Babaria whose style of conduct had resulted in in-house allegation of partiality, resulting in AICC failing to bridge the gulf between the two key leaders of the state party, Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Kumari Selja, leading to mid-poll factional flare-up.
Hariprasad, who has been brought back as in-charge of the state that he had handled in the past, has now invited Hooda, Selja, AICC general secretary Randeep Surjewala, PCC president Udai Bhan and some senior party legislators and functionaries to the meeting, it is learnt. The MLAs supporting ex-CM Hooda are rooting for his re-election to the CLP post and even as he is believed to be open to that option, Hooda is also known to be keeping the names of his loyalists such as Ashok Arora and Geeta Bokhal as tactical stand-by options. Former Deputy CM Chander Mohan is a contender for the post from outside the Hooda camp. As Udai Bhan is set to be replaced with a new PCC president, party MPs Randeep Surjewala and Deepender Hooda are seen among those in the race for the post if a non-Jat becomes the CLP leader.
The post-defeat flare-up of factional tension within the Haryana Congress has been such that the leadership could not even name the party’s Opposition leader in the assembly, despite the then newly-elected party MLAs authorising party president Mallikarjun Kharge in October to name the choice — during the first two assembly sessions. Now, there is an attempt to fill up the CLP leader’s post during the upcoming budget session of the assembly, starting March 7.
