A process to elicit views of leaders from different parts the State for selecting a new president of the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee was started by the All-India Congress Committee here on Wednesday.
Though it was officially said that the exercise was aimed at knowing the reasons for the party’s debacle in the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections three months ago, sources in the party said that the main intention was to gather inputs about different leaders ahead of the appointment of a leader to replace OPPC president Jayadev Jena.
As two AICC office-bearers in-charge of Odisha unit of the party interacted with the party leaders at the Congress Bhavan here, it was revealed that internal conflict was the main reason for the party’s poor performance in the twin polls.
A majority of the leaders, with whom AICC general secretary B.K. Hari Prasad and AICC secretary Subhankar Sarkar interacted one by one, stressed the need for immediate replacement of Mr. Jena, who led the party to the polls along with senior leader Srikant Jena as chairman of the party’s campaign committee in the State.
Mr. Prasad and Mr. Sarkar held talks with as many as 28 district presidents and about 30 leaders who contested the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. They would also hold similar discussions with the remaining candidates from different constituencies on Thursday.
Sources indicated that AICC was planning to appoint a new PCC president at an early date, as a series of allegations had been made against the both the leaders who distributed the tickets late and failed in leading the party in the run-up to the polls.
The Central leadership of the party has already consulted about 20 senior leaders in New Delhi in phases to seek their views for selecting a replacement for Mr. Jena, sources said.
Due to the delay in AICC choosing a new leader, the Congress has been lagging behind in taking up various issues, thereby giving enough scope to the Bharatiya Janata Party to grow in strength.
