New Delhi: All eyes are on Rajasthan after the Congress said a decision on the chief minister would be taken by Sonia Gandhi in a day or two, even as Ashok Gehlot said no post was important for him but he wanted to strengthen the party.
Earlier in the day, Gehlot extended his support to senior leader Mallikarjun Kharge for the Congress president post, soon after he withdrew his own candidature.
“For me, no post is important. The Congress in the country needs to be strengthened and every Indian is saying so,” Gehlot told reporters after he became a proposer for Kharge’s candidature.
Asked whether he had offered to resign as the Rajasthan chief minister when he met Sonia Gandhi, Gehlot evaded a direct response.
“I have held several positions for the past 50 years with the blessings of the Gandhi family. Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi have showered their blessings on me. For me, it is not the position that matters, but what matters is how to strengthen the party. I will make every effort towards it,” he said.
The senior leader, however, said, “If I leave any position now, there will be talks that Ashok Gehlot is running away when the Congress is in trouble.”
“I would do whatever the high command tells me,” he added.
The Rajasthan chief minister had opted out of the race for Congress president after a rebellion in the party’s state unit, with a majority of MLAs holding a parallel meeting and not allowing a legislature party meeting last Sunday to pass a one-line resolution authorising the party chief to nominate a successor to Gehlot.
Gehlot has said he felt sorry and apologised to Sonia Gandhi, which he repeated publicly outside her residence on Thursday, taking moral responsibility of having failed to get a one-line resolution passed at the CLP meeting.
K C Venugopal, however, later said a decision on the Rajasthan chief minister would be taken by Sonia Gandhi in a day or two.
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