A day after he was appointed Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee (UPCC) working president, Saharanpur MP Imran Masood, a heavyweight in western Uttar Pradesh politics, said he would work wherever the party leadership assigned him and make strengthening the organisation his primary objective.
Though he accepted the assignment, it is possible that he may not be entirely happy as the post came to him after speculation that he was positioning himself for the top job in the state unit and adopting an aggressive stance against the Samajwadi Party, a Congress ally, sources indicated. “I will work wherever the party assigns me. If it is the party’s wish that I work here, then I will work here. Our sole objective and goal is our party, to keep it standing strong and to build it up. “Our organisational rebuilding programme is underway and is nearly complete. Everything will be finalised in a few days.
We have already submitted lists for approximately 80% of the booths, so our work is progressing rapidly,” he said.
For his part, Masood pledged to devote his “body, mind and resources” to strengthening the party’s organisational structure across Uttar Pradesh following a reshuffle which saw three-time Rampur Khas MLA Aradhana Mishra ‘Mona’, a prominent Brahmin face, replace Ajay Rai, an upper caste Bhuminhar leader, as the Uttar Pradesh Congress president. I will dedicate my body, mind, and resources entirely to fulfilling the expectations with which the party has sent me here,” he said. Highlighting the Congress’s broad social base, Masood said the Congress represented people from different social and religious groups, including forward and backward castes, Dalits, Muslims, Jains, Sikhs and Buddhists. “The Congress does not belong to any single group; it is a party of the masses; it belongs to everyone,” he said, adding that the party worked in the larger interest of the nation rather than focusing on any particular caste or religion. Aradhana Mishra has been made head of the state unit, according to an official notification issued by AICC general secretary KC Venugopal.
The daughter of senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Pramod Tiwari, she previously served as the Congress Legislature Party leader in the Uttar Pradesh assembly.
