New PCC chiefs likely in four states

NEW DELHI: The Congress party is looking to make more changes in the leadership of several state units. Discussions are underway to appoint new Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) presidents in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana and Kerala, among others.

According to sources, Congress leadership may pick a leader from an upper caste community to head the party’s UP unit to replace incumbent chief Raj Babbar.

Among the leaders under consideration are Rajesh Mishra, a former Lok Sabha member from Varanasi, Jitin Prasad, a former union minister, and Rajesh Pati Triptahi, grandson of late Congress stalwart Kamalapati Tripathi.


Bihar PCC is also set to get a full-time president since Kaukab Qadri is currently acting as an officiating state party chief after Ashok Chowdhary, handpicked by Congress president Rahul Gandhi, was removed just before he defected to JD(U). However, there have been different views on which community the new PCC chief should be from.

While some felt either a leader belonging to the upper caste be made the new chief to woo back the sections, some others favoured appointing a non-Yadav OBC leader, arguing it could also help the party taking a slice off the vote-bank the JD(U) has been cultivating to add to the BJP’s upper caste base.In Haryana, the leading view among leaders is for replacing current PCC and CLP leaders – Ashok Tanwar and Kiran Chowdhary -- with another Dalit-Jat combination. Though a near consensus had been arrived at in making Kumari Selja as PCC chief and Bhupinder Singh Hooda or his choice as the CLP leader, the talks got bogged down due to Congress presidential election and AICC session, and is likely to be renewed soon.

In Kerala, senior leader Mulappilly Ramachadran is in the reckoning for the PCC chief ’s post along with Oomman Chandy’s nominee Benny Behnan, Ramesh Chennithala’s nominee VD Satheesan and neutral leader K Muralidharan.