Mumbai: Congress leaders demand MRCC reform

City Congress leaders with the national president Mallikarjun Kharge in New Delhi on Tuesday. Pic/AICC

Differences in the Mumbai Regional Congress Committee (MRCC) have come to the fore just ahead of the Assembly elections. The party's senior leaders, including some former city chiefs, have asked the national president Mallikarjun to mull over providing better leadership to the unit.

The leaders met Kharge in New Delhi on Tuesday after having discussed the matter with the national general secretary in-charge of Maharashtra, Ramesh Chennithala. About a week ago, a pressure group of 16 senior leaders had sent Kharge a signed letter seeking his time to discuss reforms for the Mumbai unit. Apparently on Tuesday, the leaders indirectly suggested to Kharge that they wished incumbent Varsha Gaikwad, the newly-elected Lok Sabha member, to be replaced at the earliest.

The rift in MRCC was on public display early this week when the disgruntled lot staged a protest against the NEET independently of a Gaikwad-organised agitation. The Lok Sabha elections were no different as far as factionalism was concerned. Gaikwad had grabbed a poll ticket from Mumbai North Central despite opposition from most others in the party. When denied a ticket, aspirant Naseem Khan had resigned as the star campaigner, but retracted later on.

The meeting

On Tuesday, Rajya Sabha MP and AICC member Chandrakant Handore, state Congress working president Naseem Khan, state Congress treasurer Dr Amarjit Singh Manhas, ex-MRCC president Bhai Jagtap, MRCC working president Charan Singh Sapra, state Congress general secretary Zakir Ahmed, MRCC general secretary Bhushan Patil, senior leader Shivji Singh, ex-MLA Madhu Chavan and others called on Kharge, who gave them a patient hearing but promised nothing. Some leaders stayed back in the capital to attend a state-related meeting to be held later by the All India Congress Committee.

According to one attendee, the party's unsuccessful Lok Sabha candidate complained about non-cooperation from the city leadership. Others talked about the party's better prospects in the wake of the Lok Sabha success in Maharashtra and Mumbai, where one seat was lost and the other won. The city has elected six MPs, and it will vote for 36 MLAs in October. Since seat-sharing will be a tricky subject in view of ally Shiv Sena's upper hand, the leaders wanted Kharge to appoint someone tougher to deal with the MVA partners. Several other things required for the party's Assembly success were also discussed.

‘Introspection needed'

A leader from the Gaikwad camp said that the democratic party like Congress was used to such resentment. According to him, all MRCC chiefs of the past were hit by faction feuds at some point or other. He said that the leaders who wished for the party's resurgence in Mumbai should introspect because some of them did not have the guts to contest elections out of fear of losing from the constituencies they had won multiple times in the past.