03 July,2019 12:19 AM IST | Mumbai | Dharmendra Jore
Congress President Rahul Gandhi is said to have decided on Balasaheb Thorat. Pic/Twitter
Balasaheb Thorat, who was recently named the leader of the Congress legislative party, is also expected to head the state unit of the party. Incumbent president Ashok Chavan had resigned in the wake of the Lok Sabha debacle, but the decision is still pending. Sources said the declaration about Thorat was just a formality.
Thorat shot into prominence during the Lok Sabha campaign when party president Rahul Gandhi stayed overnight in his town and spent quality time with his family. The development was seen as a trust-building exercise, in view of the rebellion of another senior leader and Thorat's arch-rival Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil and his son against the Congress. The latter joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) last month and was inducted as a cabinet minister. His son Sujay has been elected as a BJP MP.
A sitting legislator from Sangamner in Ahmednagar and a former revenue minister, Thorat is a low-profile leader who doesn't belong to any faction, and is known as an amiable and soft-spoken person.
Like its national organisation, the state Congress has been facing a leadership crisis. Chavan is accused of failing party workers and Lok Sabha candidates by not putting in required efforts. Chavan himself lost his Nanded seat to the BJP despite spending considerable time on his own campaign. In 2014, he was among the two party MPs, but this time the party won just one seat (from Chandrapur).
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Several leaders from Maharashtra who headed the party's frontal organisations have resigned to draw Gandhi's attention to their plea that he reconsider his decision to resign as national president. Despite being unwilling to continue in the position, Gandhi had convened a meeting of Maharashtra leaders, so that the organisation does not get paralysed ahead of the October Assembly polls. He is said to have decided on the name of Thorat.
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