Congress Working Committee meeting likely on August 4 at Rahul Gandhi's residence

NEW DELHI: The Congress Working Committee is likely to meet on August 4 at party chief Rahul Gandhi's residence, news agency ANI reported. Rahul chaired his first CWC meet as the party president on July 22, two days after a no confidence motion was moved in Lok Sabha which the Opposition lost.

Rahul's CWC has 23 regular members instead of 25 allowed by the party constitution. It has 18 permanent and eight special invitees.

In the last meeting, Rahul had said that a special group within the Congress will be set up to discuss probable alliances for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The extended CWC had authorised Rahul to forge an alliance with like-minded parties for the 2019 Lok Sabha election to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

"We are setting up a group that is going to do that (alliance)," Rahul had said after the  Congress Working Committee meeting. During the CWC, he said that the expansion of the party's vote base is one of the biggest tasks. "In each constituency, we have to find people who have not voted for us and develop a strategy to reach out to them and win back their trust," he said.

"In the short term, we can come together with other parties and win the coming elections. After that, the damage done by the BJP & RSS to India's institutions will have to be undone. Only the Congress can do this," Rahul said.

Thirty-five to 40 leaders spoke at the meeting where they all stressed that the Congress should play a lead role in forging an anti-BJP front. Some leaders said Rahul being the leader of the principle opposition party should be the face of the national alliance.