Mumbai, Feb. 21 -- Congress leader Rahul Gandhi met his colleagues in Mumbai on Saturday and inquired about the party's poor show in the January 15 Mumbai civic polls.
He took stock of the prevailing political situation as well as steps being taken to strengthen the Congress' position across Maharashtra, party functionaries said.
Gandhi had earlier in the day appeared before the Bhiwandi magistrate's court in neighbouring Thane district to furnish a fresh surety in the 2014 defamation case filed against him by an RSS activist. He named Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal as his new guarantor in place of former Union minister Shivraj Patil, who passed away in December last year.
Gandhi's luncheon meeting here took place in a suburban hotel before he flew back to Delhi. Among those present were Sapkal and Mumbai unit chief and Lok Sabha MP Varsha Gaikwad.
Gandhi questioned the poor showing by the Congress in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation polls, sources said. The party won just 24 seats in the 227-member BMC, leading to questions on whether the decision to go solo without its Maha Vikas Aghadi allies Shiv Sena (UBT) and NCP (SP) was a wise one.
The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha told the Mumbai unit to gear up towards strengthening the organisation at the grassroots, the sources added.
"Gandhi took a review of the party's position in Mumbai and Maharashtra. He had a one-on-one meeting with Sapkal on the party organisation," they added.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.