RULE BY TWITTER
Few Congressmen know when Rahul Gandhi, the Congress vice president, is in town or not, because the only glimpse of his leadership they have is via his tweets. Yes, he has been very active on his Twitter account of late, tweeting about GST, the China standoff and against the RSS. But ever since his visit to Mandsaur, he has not been seen anywhere, even though we are told he is back from his trip to visit his ailing grandmother. Unfortunately, when there is a Prime Minister who is in the limelight 24/7, Rahul will have to do more than just tweet his presence.
DID CONGRESS MISS PRESIDENTIAL BOAT?
The Congress has for long been claiming that the Presidential elections would be the first sign of Opposition unity against the government and were seeing it as a precursor to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Well that came to naught, with Nitish Kumar jumping ship. Now other Opposition leaders are blaming the Congress for this defection, saying that had they not delayed so long in affecting a consensus and announcing the Opposition’s candidate for PM before the government announced its candidate, Nitish would have had a hard time not committing his support to the Opposition camp, instead of letting the government steal the initiative.
CONGRESS RESHUFFLE POSSIBLE IN 10 DAYS
There are whispers at 24 Akbar Road that the much awaited decision on the Madhya Pradesh PCC could be announced within the next fortnight. The choice is between Jyotiraditya Scindia and Kamal Nath and it seems as if the decision could go in the favour of the former. If that is the case, how will Kamal Nath take it, for the veteran politician is an influencer in the state and his wishes will need to be taken on board? Some other changes are also in the offing. Congress leaders are hoping to see a change in the Haryana PCC as well, which has another Rahul favourite Ashok Tanwar at the helm, but he is not very popular with the rest of the party cadre. Will Rahul continue to play favourites or take some hard decisions regarding Haryana? And how will he handle the Madhya Pradesh hot potato? Well, Congressmen are hoping that whatever decision he takes, is sooner than later, as these are two states where the party is sensing a chance of a comeback.