The Congress on Saturday announced its new PCC chief, appointing Amarinder Singh Raja Waring as Navjot Singh Sidhu’s successor, and even appointing Qadian MLA Pratap Singh Bajwa as the leader of the Congress Legislative Party (CLP) in the Punjab Assembly.
Sidhu resigned after the party’s defeat in the recent state elections on the instructions of party president Sonia Gandhi.
By appointing Waring, a 44-year-old former Indian Youth Congressman and Giddarbaha MLA, as PPCC chief, the Congress high command seems to have given priority to a young face and placed a mature leader and a former MP as CLP leaders against Bhagwant. The standard-led AAP government.
Sonia Gandhi has released a list of new appointments, which, according to insiders, seems to have a clear “stamp” on Rahul Gandhi. Former Minister of State Bharat Bhushan Ashu has been appointed acting president of the Punjab Congress and Chabbewal MLA Raj Kumar Chabbewal will be the Deputy CLP leader.
Ashu started his political career as a Congress councilor from Ludhiana in 1997 and later became a councilor three times and a MLA twice. He belongs to a business family who owns a dairy farm.
Waring, who represents Giddarbahar in the state assembly, is said to have been selected by Rahul Gandhi to lead the Indian Youth Congress in his previous years in his party. He will face tough challenges to manage the affairs of the state unit due to factionalism and losses caused by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). Although he seems to be enjoying Sidhu’s support, he has to take all the team along to get the team out of the crisis.
Bajwa, a former Rajya Sabha MP, was also Gandhi’s choice for the upper house. Although he has never publicly criticized the party high command, he has consistently pointed the finger at state leadership.
Chabbewal is a veteran Scheduled Caste leader from Punjab. The party has struck a fine balance among the communities representing all the major groups in the state through the latest restructuring.
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