Thiruvananthapuram: Congress president Rahul Gandhi is expected to visit Wayanad in the first week of June to thank the electorate for his record breaking victory from this Lok Sabha constituency in Kerala in the 2019 polls.
This was disclosed by Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala after the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) met for the first time after registering a resounding victory in the Lok Sabha polls, winning all but one of the 20 seats in the state.
A source close to the Congress party said that Rahul Gandhi`s visit could be either on Saturday or Monday.
The Gandhi scion had won with the highest ever margin of victory in any Lok Sabha election with 431,770 votes.
He defeated his nearest rival PP Suneer of the Communist Party of India who secured 274,597 votes while Gandhi received 706,367 votes.
"This huge victory has placed more responsibility on us and we assure the people that this victory will not get into their heads. They will always work for the people of the state," Chennithala said.
Rahul's scheduled Kerala visit comes at a time when there are speculations that he is not too keen to continue as Congress president in the backdrop of his party's defeat in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
Though the Congress party on Monday issued a statement urging everyone to respect the sanctity of its working committee meeting.
The party also asked the media not to fall into the trap of "conjectures, insinuations, gossip and rumour-mongering".
Referring to the May 25 meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the highest decision-making body of the party, Congress's chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said it was a democratic forum for exchange of ideas and taking corrective action, adding that it was a "closed-door" meet and any speculation about it was unwarranted and uncalled for.
He added that the CWC was a forum for formulating policies and taking corrective action and in this context, the members had expressed their views at the meeting.
Surjewala said the CWC saw the reverses in the Lok Sabha polls as an opportunity for radical changes and a complete organisational overhaul and authorised Congress president Rahul Gandhi for the necessary measures.
"The Congress party expects everyone, including the media, to respect the sanctity of a closed-door meeting of the CWC. Various conjectures, speculation, insinuations, assumptions, gossip and rumour-mongering in a section of the media is uncalled for and unwarranted.''
"The CWC held a collective deliberation on the performance of the party, the challenges before it as also the way ahead, instead of casting aspersions on the role or conduct of any specific individual. The gist of the deliberations was made public in the CWC resolution of May 25, 2019," the Congress leader said in a statement.
"We would request everyone, including the media, to not fall into the trap of conjectures or speculation and await the calibrated efforts by the Congress party towards the future course of action," he added.
Surjewala was reacting to news reports about the happenings at the May 25 meeting, the first of the CWC after the Congress's humiliating defeat in the parliamentary polls, where Rahul Gandhi offered to resign as the party chief.
(With Agency inputs)
