Arvind Kejriwal re-elected as AAP National Convenor

NEW DELHI: Arvind Kejriwal was today re-elected as the National Convenor of AAP even as the party effected a major overhaul of its top brass by inducting five new faces including a woman in its Political Affairs Committee (PAC), the highest decision making body.

In the first rejig of the PAC after expulsion of Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan last year, the party brought into the body six fresh faces -- Ashutosh, Atishi Marlena, the lone woman member in the PAC, Durgesh Pathak, Raghav Chadha, Okhla MLA Amanatullah Khan and Punjab MP Sadhu Singh.

Apart from Kejriwal, those who were retained in the PAC include Manish Sisodia, Gopal Rai, Sanjay Singh, Kumar Vishwas and Pankaj Gupta.

The PAC has also appointed Gupta as the national secretary and Chadha as the treasurer of the party. All the PAC members are national executive members.

"Arvind Kejriwal was unanimously elected as the new National Convenor of the party. The National Executive also chose Pankaj Gupta as National Secretary and Raghav Chadha as National Treasurer," Pankaj Bajpai, party spokesperson, said.

Ilyas Azmi, who was member of the PAC earlier, has not found a place at the reconstituted body as he did not make it to the national executive.

Earlier in the day, the National Council also elected new National Executive members.

The 25-member restructured body has several members from Punjab, which is going to polls in 2017, the party's next big focus in the electoral arena. Apart from them, five state convenors became ex-officio members of NE.

The national executive members include Kejriwal, Sisodia, Sanjay Singh, Rai, Gupta, Ashutosh and Kumar Vishwas.

The new entrants are Yamini Gomar, Rajendra Pal Gautam, Preeti Sharma Menon, Durgesh Pathak, Bhagwant Mann, Kanu Bhai Kalsaria, Harjot Bains, Baljinder Kaur, Raghav Chadha, Ashish Talwar, Marlena, Sadhu Singh, Dinesh Vaghela, Meera Sanyal, Bhawna Gaur, Rakhi Birla, Imran Hussain and Khan.

In the National Council meeting on March 28 last year, there was high drama as Yadav and Bhushan and their supporters alleged that bouncers manhandled them.