'Revisit secularism': Cong loyalist Tewari introspects into party pitfalls after CWC meet

As the Congress loyalists continue to self-introspect the lapses in the grand-old party, more voices suggesting organisational amends in the party's functioning are coming to the fore. Days after a dramatic fight in its virtual meeting, on Saturday, party MP Manish Tewari has said that problem of India is the absence of viable Opposition and has suggested a series of changes required to revive the party. 

Penning an article for The Week, Manish Tewari - Congress MP from Anandpur Sahib, has batted for organisational change in the party. Tewari - considered a loyalist of the Gandhi family and Rahul Gandhi - said that uncertainty at the top must end. While he lashed out at younger people of the party, both naming and shaming them for not aligning to the ideological core of Congress, he proclaimed that the grand-old party needs to 'revisit its position on secularism' and 'must define its vision of nationalism'. He added that Congress has never been able to align its own economic philosophy with the economic shift in the past. 

Though Tewari said that interim president Sonia Gandhi has successfully led the party to electoral victories, he also stated that if placing a Nehru-Gandhi at the helm of affairs is a 'non-sequitur', then, Congress must hold an election to the post of president and to the working committee.

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Tension between Rahul's supporters and Sonia's supporters soar?

Manish Tewari's self-inspection of sorts comes exactly a week after Congress party’s top leadership came to blows over a heated video-conferencing meeting wherein two sitting Congress MPs lambasted the party’s senior national leadership and, in particular, former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh for the dismal electoral performances of 2014 and 2019. 

Sources had told Republic World that Congressmen and Rajya Sabha MPs KC Venugopal and Rajiv Satav - said to be a close circle of Rahul Gandhi spoke out aggressively against Manmohan Singh’s leadership in UPA II in the virtual meeting of the Congress party. Tensions spilt on to social media as Tewari asked if UPA was 'sabotaged from within?'

At a time when the Congress party is facing chaos in Rajasthan and has already lost one of its top leader - Jyotiraditya Scindia, & with Sachin Pilot at the verge of exiting the party, views by Manish Tewari comes as a continuation of the lack of cohesion in the party. With Tewari crediting Rahul Gandhi for his resignation following the 2019 poll snub as 'courage of conviction', and lashing out at those who left the party because of differences with the top leadership, it seems as if the internal chaos in the Congress vis-a-vis Gandhi family is a long-drawn struggle. 

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