Team Rahul scores in Congress shake-up

After a long wait the Congress announced a major organisational reshuffle,  an exercise that a section in the party hoped will put a lid on a growing buzz over differences between its younger leaders and the old guard, even as fresh discontent appeared to be brewing over the move. The special committee members include AK Antony, Ahmed Patel, KC Venugopal and Mukul Wasnik, apart from Ambika Soni and Randeep Surjewala. The members of this team will assist Sonia Gandhi in organisational  and day to day matters.

Ghulam Nabi Azad has been dropped as a general secretary though he remains a part of the Congress Working Committee, the party's top decision-making panel.Motilal Vora, Ambika Soni and Mallikarjun Kharge have also been removed as general secretaries of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) in the Friday shuffle.The Congress Working Committee (CWC) has been reconstituted and P Chidambaram, Tariq Anwar, Randeep Surjewala, and Jitendra Singh have been named as its regular members.Randeep Singh Surjewala, a Rahul Gandhi loyalist, is among the biggest gainers of the shuffle. He has been named general secretary in charge of Karnataka, a member of the special committee to oversee organizational changes and he remains chief spokesperson. Like him, KC Venugopal is also a member of most committees. Another member of Team Rahul, Jitendra Singh, is now in charge of Assam.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will continue to be in charge of Uttar Pradesh, while Rahul Gandhi loyalist Manickam Tagore will be the new secretary in-charge for Telangana.New members of the Congress Working Committee will be - Digvijay Singh, Rajiv Shukla, Manickam Tagore, Pramod Tiwari, Jairam Ramesh, HK Patil, Salman Khurshid, Pawan Bansal, Dinesh Gundurao, Manish Chatrath and Kuljit Nagra.The signatories are reportedly unhappy with what they believe are "cosmetic changes" in the party.