UP: 3-day workshop for newly appointed Cong committee from October 14

Lucknow: A three-day workshop for the newly appointed state Congress committee will be held in Rae Bareli beginning October 14 which is also likely to be attended by general secretary in-charge Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.

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Congress working president Sonia Gandhi could also visit Rae Bareli for a day, during which she will be introduced with the new team entrusted with the responsibility of preparing the party for the next major electoral battle in 2022, party sources said here.

Sonia Gandhi's representative in Rae Bareli, K L Sharma, while confirming about the workshop, said the programme of the leaders will be worked out at an important meeting in New Delhi slated for Saturday.

Sources in the party said heads of the Congress training department and the social media cell will address the participants and answer their queries.

Since the new team is younger than the outgoing panel, the party feels the members will benefit from a briefing.

The AICC had on Monday night announced a new Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee, appointing Ajay Kumar Lallu as the new president and Aradhana Misra 'Mona' as the leader of the Congress Legislature Party.

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It had also appointed 12 general secretaries and 24 secretaries besides an 18-member advisory council to the general secretary and an eight-member working group on strategy and planning, comprising senior leaders.

A section of the Congress in Uttar Pradesh is unhappy with the appointment of the new committee, particularly with the nomination of an OBC leader as its head and the "sidelining" of upper castes.

One leader called it an "experiment" like internal elections in the youth wing of the party.

"Similarly, this is another experiment in which the leadership appears to be thinking about social engineering," the leader who did not want to be named said.

Some leaders like Siraj Mehdi and Rajesh Mishra have openly expressed dissatisfaction with appointment of the new committee.

Misra, who was named in the advisory council to the general secretary, has already refused to take up the new responsibility and advised the party to "introspect".

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"I have apprised about my decision to the office of Priyanka ji. I am not in a position to advise her," Mishra told news persons on Thursday.

Another senior leader and former MLC Siraj Mehdi has sent his resignation from the AICC and the PCC over the issue, saying it seems that preference has been given to people who have come from other parties and senior leaders have been ignored. Also, there is no representation of the Shia community in this new team, he said.