Toughest challenge: When Sonia faced a ‘revolt’ in 2020

New Delhi, Dec 30 : Helming the grand old party of India since 1998, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi faced her toughest political battle in 2020 when a group of 23 party leaders wrote to her to demand sweeping internal reforms, including organisational elections.
In the letter, the party leaders said that “the leadership should be effective and visible on the ground”.
The leaders were miffed with the party for reducing itself to holding only press conferences and posting tweets, said a signatory to the letter on the condition of anonymity.
They said that the party leadership should take everybody along and put up a serious challenge to the BJP. The signatories included party veterans Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, former Chief Ministers Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Veerappa Moily, Rajinder Kaur Bhattal, and Prithviraj Chavan, said party sources.
The letter lamented that the “party is declining and unable to confront the rise of the BJP in the country”.
In a subsequent Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting in August, her loyalists turned the tables on dissenters as the highest decision-making body of the party decided that Sonia Gandhi will continue as interim party chief till a new President was elected and that the next CWC meeting will be called in six months.