With the District Congress Committee (DCC ) in Kottayam unable to break the deadlock over the revamp of its mandalam committees in the absence of consensus within the leadership, the ball is now in the State leadership’s court to finalise the process.
Party sources said the DCC was racing against time to wrap up the task before the district Congress convention here on Friday. The final list of restructured committees was expected to be presented for the approval of Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president K. Sudhakaran on his arrival to attend the event. This will be followed by an official announcement of the new mandalam presidents by the district leadership.
Although the process of revamp began shortly after the restructuring of block committees in June this year, the process was put on hold in view of the by-election in Puthuppally. The process was further delayed by a lack of consensus among the party groups on the nominees to these posts. Unable to break the deadlock, the district leadership even effected a unilateral change in the KPCC’s directive to remove all mandalam presidents who had served for two and a half years, opting instead for a five-year limit.
Some senior leaders, however, stood unfazed and insisted on re-nominating a few who had already exceeded the time period, further delaying the restructuring process.
“Of the 83 mandalam committees in the district, a list of 37 presidents have been submitted to the KPCC. Among these, a few committees have retained the mandalam presidents, who have served for more than five years,” said a Congress leader.
With the leaders failing to reach a consensus on the presidents to be nominated to the remaining 48 committees, the party sub-committee that leads the revamp process has now decided to submit a panel of names to the KPCC.
“The list proposes more than one name for some units and the final list will be announced after due consultations with the KPCC president’’, said another leader.
The State leadership has already issued strict instructions to the district committees to expedite the revamp in view of the impending Lok Sabha elections next year so as to engage each unit with specific tasks. Once the mandalam presidents are announced, the booth committees will undergo a revamp.
