Signalling that the Congress party is getting ready to change the way it functions, Congress president Rahul Gandhi renamed the the party’s computer cell as the Data Analytics Department and appointed former investment banker Praveen Chakravarty as its head.
Tagging a photo of Mr. Chakravarty and him, Mr. Gandhi tweeted, “Excited to announce a ‘Data Analytics’ department under the leadership of Praveen Chakravarty to effectively use ‘Big Data’.”
Focus on economy
The department of Data Analytics is the latest addition to the Congress party’s new wings, which include the All India Professionals’ Congress, the Unorganised Workers’ Congress and the All India Fishermen Congress.
The choice of Mr. Chakravarty, a former investment banker and angel investor, could indicate that the Congress is likely to focus on the economy in the run-up to 2019. His Twitter timeline, for example, has an analysis of the latest Economic Survey where his data mining showed “nearly 90% of all organised sector ‘formal’ employees earn less than ₹15,000 a month.”
Rajathan polls
On February 1, he asserted that his data analysis of the by-election results in Rajasthan show that people don’t vote differently in State and Lok Sabha polls. “They either like a party or they don’t,” he said.
The Congress president, in fact, met the newly-elected lawmakers of his party from the State, two of whom took oath as members of the Lok Sabha before it was adjourned for the day.
