Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: Congress on Saturday night picked Ashok Chavan, the incumbent Chief Minister to fill the Maharashtra CM’s post for the second time. It also announced that Bhupinder Singh Hooda would continue as the Haryana Chief Minister.
While the decision to retain Chavan was widely anticipated, the Haryana CM’s post was less certain. The Congress MLAs of both states had left the decision to the Congress President Sonia Gandhi.
Earlier while, the party scrambled to resolve the leadership issue in the two states, clarity emerged in Arunachal Pradesh, where the party retained power with an emphatic victory, with incumbent Khandu Dorjee being unanimously elected CLP leader who will take oath as Chief Minister Sunday morning.
Efforts to find chief ministers for Maharashtra and Haryana shifted to Delhi after CLPs there leaving the leadership issue to Gandhi who then held several rounds of separate meetings with the party`s observers for the two states at her residence here.
Shortly after Maharashtra CLP authorised her to choose its leader, Gandhi tonight held consultations with AICC observers Digvijay Singh, A K Antony and K Rehman Khan who apprised her about the outcome of CLP meeting in Mumbai earlier in the day.
The three observers were accompanied by Chief Minister Ashok Chavan, senior leader Narayan Rane, Union Ministers Vilsasrao Deshmukh and Sushil Kumar Shinde and PCC President Manikrao Thakeray who are said to be in the race for chief ministership in the state.
The observers met Congress MLAs separately in Mumbai eliciting their views on leadership issue and most of them left the decision to Gandhi while some expressed their preference, Antony told reporters in Mumbai.
Gandhi also consultations with observers for Haryana Prithviraj Chavan, Mohsina Kidwai and B K Hariprasad who earlier in the day had a meeting with the state leaders over the issue of leadership.
Sources said the party has arrived at a final decision and an announcement was expected to be made soon.
The observers for Haryana apprised Gandhi with the outcome of the CLP meeting in Chandigarh, which had authorised her to take a final decision, as also their talks with state leaders, who included the MPs from the state.
The Haryana leaders, who met at the residence of AICC observer for Haryana Mohsina Kidwai, included Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Haryana Congress president Phool Chand Mullana, all nine party MPs from the state and former CLP leader Ajay Yadav.
While Hooda was absent in the first meeting this morning, he joined the leaders for the second round of discussions that took place later in the day, sources said.
AICC observer Prithviraj Chavan, who is also party general secretary in-charge of the state, and another observer B K Hariprasad were present during the discussions to arrive at a consensus.
On the other hand, a group of Congress leaders from Haryana, who are said to be opposed to Hooda`s candidature for chief ministership, held a meeting at the residendce of Faridabad MP Avtar Singh Badhana.
Those who attended the meeting included union minister Kumari Selja and Haryana minister Kiran Chaudhury. Both are said to be in the race for chief ministership.
