No place for Tharoor as Kharge forms steering committee to stand in for Congress’s top panel CWC

From G-23, only Anand Sharma and Mukul Wasnik made the cut. Other big names to miss the bus include Bhupinder and Deepinder Hooda, Manish Tewari, and Prithviraj Chavan

File photo of Mallikarjun Kharge and Shashi Tharoor after results of the Congress presidential elections were announced| ANI

New Delhi: In his first organisational move as Congress president, Mallikarjun Kharge Wednesday constituted a 47-member Steering Committee to function in place of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) — the highest decision making body of the party — till a new CWC is constituted.

Shashi Tharoor, Kharge’s rival in the Congress presidential elections, did not find a place in the committee.

Though Tharoor had received 1,072 votes compared to Kharge’s 7,897, his performance against a perceived “establishment candidate” who had the blessings of the Gandhi family was better than that of party stalwarts Sharad Pawar and Rajesh Pilot in the 1997 presidential election.

Pawar secured 888 votes and Pilot got 354 as against Sitaram Kesri’s 6,224 in the tripartite contest that was till recently the last time a non-Gandhi was elected as Congress president.

Given Tharoor’s performance and his spirit to compete even though Kharge was an “establishment” candidate, it was expected that he would be accommodated in an important organisational role. In fact, Tharoor had expressed willingness to work with Kharge for the sake of the party after the poll result was out.

The Lok Sabha MP from Thiruvananthapuram was also a part of the dissident G-23 group which wrote to then interim president Sonia Gandhi asking for a “visible leadership”.

Hooda & Tewari out, Anand Sharma accommodated 

Of the G-23 members, only Anand Sharma and Mukul Wasnik have made it to the steering committee. While Wasnik had made peace with the Gandhis a while back, Sharma was, till recently, a dissident. Both, however, had signed as nominators for Kharge’s candidacy.

A surprise omission is former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, who was also a G-23 member. Hooda holds mass appeal in Haryana and also has considerable sway in the party’s state unit. His son, Deepender Hooda, had campaigned for Kharge in the run up to the organisational polls. Both Hoodas have not made it to the panel.

Similarly, Manish Tewari and Prithviraj Chavan — both from the dissident group — have also not made it to the committee in spite of having nominated Kharge over Tharoor in the presidential election.

All members of the CWC submitted their resignations to Kharge after he took over as the party president Wednesday.

(Edited by Tony Rai)