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Congress reserves party posts for women, weaker sections

Senior Congress politician Kunnoth Karunakaran today moved a resolution to amend the party constitution and ensure 33 per cent reservation for women and not less than 20 per cent for the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, other backward classes, and minorities in various Congress committees.

While moving the resolution at the All-India Congress Committee session in New Delhi, Karunakaran also proposed the constitution of trusts at the national and regional levels to hold the party's immovable properties.

"Each pradesh Congress committee/regional Congress committee shall, in accordance with the directions/guidelines issued by the working committee of the AICC, constitute a trust for holding immovable properties belonging to Congress committees, block Congress committees and other committees subordinate to the PCC/RCC," the resolution said.

It said, "The board of trustees of the said trust shall not be less than three trustees nor more than nine trustees, including the chairman and other ex-officio trustees. The board of trustees shall be appointed."

The resolution said the CWC would constitute a trust for holding the immovable properties of the AICC and also appoint the board of trustees.

The party president will be the chairman of the trust and the AICC treasurer and general secretary in-charge of administration will be ex-officio members of the board.

The amendment also envisages the constitution of a central organisational election authority comprising not less than three and not more than five members, one of who will be the chairman.

The chairman and members of the authority will not hold any organisational office during their tenure.

The authority will supervise and oversee enrolment of new members. It will also finalise the calendar of elections starting from enrolment of members to the stage of completion of elections.

The resolution has also recommended constitution of a nine-member parliamentary board instead of the current seven. Likewise, the central election committee will have nine members instead of seven.

Following are the amendments proposed in the constitution of the Indian National Congress.

• Reservation for women, SCs, STs, OBCs, minorities:
• 33 per cent of the seats in different committees for women.
• not less than 20 per cent of the seats in different committees for the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, other backward classes, and minorities.
• The term of every Congress committee and its office-bearers, executive committee, and members shall ordinarily be three years. Earlier, it was two years.
• Every district Congress committee shall consist of six members (against four earlier) elected by secret ballot by the block Congress committees in that district as per the rules prescribed by the working committee.
• The period of Congress membership shall be raised from two to three years and the membership fee from Re 1 to Rs 3.
• The number of members of the pradesh Congress committees of Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Pondicherry, Sikkim and Tripura shall be equal to the strength of the respective assemblies.
• The All-India Congress Committee shall have four members each (against one earlier) elected from Chandigarh, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, and Lakshadweep.
• All members of the Congress party belonging to village councils or municipal bodies, legislative assemblies, councils, or Parliament shall be ex-officio members of the Congress committees at the corresponding levels such as unit, block, town, district, and region.

UNI

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