The Congress leadership had rejected Mr Gogoi's offer to resign from the chief minister's post, after the party's debacle in the national election last month. (File photo)
The Congress central leadership may soon remove Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, sources told NDTV.
The Congress leadership had rejected Mr Gogoi's offer to resign from the chief minister's post, after the party's debacle in the national election last month. But this time, the pressure from the dissidents in the party's state unit, led by state Education and Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma, has forced the Congress leadership to rethink, sources said. Nearly 45 MLAs out of Congress' 78 MLAs are pushing for a leadership change, and Mr Gogoi, may instead be asked to head the coalition in Assam.
Sources have also told NDTV that Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge is likely to go as an observer to Guwahati sometime next week to ascertain the strength of both the camps. A final decision will be taken only after the Congress Legislature Party meeting.
Assam's chief minister for 13 years, Mr Gogoi has been facing dissidence for over two years now, but the Lok Sabha debacle made his continuation untenable. The party managed just three out of 14 seats in a state where it has been in power since 2001.
The BJP registered its best-ever performance in the north-eastern state which had come to be regarded as a Congress stronghold. It won seven of the 14 seats, leaving the ruling Congress and Badruddin Ajmal's Assam United Democratic Front, or the AUDF, to share three seats each. Mr Gogoi's son, Gourav, somehow managed to save his family's prestige by winning the Kaliabor parliamentary constituency by a margin of about 94,000 votes.
Sources close to the 78-year-old chief minister have blamed "indiscipline" and "factionalism" for the party's poor show in the parliamentary polls.
The development signals a revamp mode in Congress. Apart from Assam, the party is reportedly looking at a possible change of chief ministers in Maharashtra and Haryana too. Sources say the revamp will not confine itself to just containing rebellion but also bringing in new faces in the form of party chiefs in the states.