From our bureo
NEW DELHI: Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Vadra, AICC general secretary, have fallen apart, after she approached their mother and Congress President Sonia Gandhi to remove three Rahul loyalists from their posts.
Her logic is that removal of Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal, Congress general secretary and chief spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala and Congress general secretary Ajay Maken from their positions to difuse the heat against the Gandhi family.
Rahul has, however, told Sonia that these three will be required by him to run the party if he agrees to head the party again in the organisational elections due in October. An angry Priyanka has moved out to her bungalow in Himachal Pradesh on Sonia not heeding her request.
Sonia is understood to have sent senior leader and her personal aide Ambika Soni to Shimla to persuade Priyanka. Sources say Priyanka is personally upset with Surjewala for the way he mishandled her publicity during the recent Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.