Rahul’s elevation in Congress imminent
of the Grand Old Party following the successful completion of organisational elections. However, the membership drive itself is yet to be completed. According to the previous schedule the elections were due to be completed by this time ( July-September), but since the membership drive has been put on hold, the schedule is set to stretch. The CWC member said that the new schedule would be decided upon in the next meeting of the party’s highest decision making body.
At the moment, according to sources, the membership drive has been put on hold because of several reasons. The most important one, sources say, is that the decision to re-introduce the provision about having active and primary members. This provision used to be part of the party’s Constitution earlier. However, it was later removed. Gandhi is in favour of the provision as he believes it will break the stranglehold of vested interests in the party, who fudge membership numbers and expend money power in order to make members and increase their personal clout. “This is hurting the party at a structural level as well as weakening the foundations,” said the aide.
Sources added that the provision can only be re-introduced following the assent of the All India Congress Committee, which needs to meet and approve it. The CWC had already proposed it in its meeting in January earlier this year.
A member is to be considered active if he makes 25 new members. “This way, we can make the system from wholesale to retail. Instead of one leader making a lakh members by fudging numbers and spending money, we can have 5,000 active members adding primary members. These active members will then meet and select the office-bearers of the block committee, who will in turn do the same for district committees and so on till the state level,” said the aide. The membership of active members will be renewed every three years instead of five, as was the practice earlier, said the aide. “Several leaders also capture the membership forms. This is why we have introduced online membership and app-based membership,” the aide added.