Cong needs ‘major surgery’: Moily

New Delhi: Asserting that the Congress needs a “major surgery” in the wake of the Lok Sabha polls debacle, senior leader M Veerappa Moily says Rahul Gandhi must carry out a complete overhaul of the party by holding elections at every level and quell internal bickering with an “iron hand”.

Emphasising that Gandhi alone can lead the party, he said it is the AICC in-charges and chiefs of states, where the party has done badly, who should be held accountable and not the Congress president.

Moily asserted that Gandhi continues to be the AICC president and he has not stepped down.

“He (Gandhi) said that owning moral responsibility he will step down. (The Congress) Working Committee (CWC) has been unanimous to say that he has to continue. That holds good even today,” he told PTI in an interview here.

Moily said it was not fair that Gandhi, who took over the reins of the Congress in 2017, quits as president after being at the helm only for about one and a half years and asserted that he must be given a substantial time to prove himself. Moily asserted that with elections in states such as Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Haryana coming up, Gandhi has to immediately step in.

“This is not the time to deliberate on who should be the next president. He has to put proper people in-charge of states in the AICC, start the process right now, without any loss of time. Proper candidates for elections will have to be selected… One has to take the reins in his hands and that should be done only by Rahul Gandhi now,” the former Union minister said.