Veteran politician Mallikarjun Kharge was elected president of the India’s Congress Party on Wednesday, the first non-Gandhi to head the party in two decades, after counting of votes in a nationwide election held two days earlier.
A senior Rajya Sabha MP from Karnataka, Mallikarjun Kharge is a long-time loyalist of the Gandhi family. He joined the Congress party in 1969. Kharge represented labor unions in his early career, reports Telegraph India.
Belonging from the Dali community, Kharge was born in 1942 in Bidar district of the southern state. Kharge was a law student and from his early student life, he took an active interest in politics.
In 1972, the then Congress party chief in Karnataka, Devaraj Urs, convinced Kharge to contest from an upper-caste dominated constituency, Gurmitkal. He won that constituency nine times consecutively. Later, he contested and also won from Chitapur.
His rise to national politics began after the 2009 general elections, where he contested and won the Gulbarga parliamentary seat to gain entry to the Lok Sabha for the first time. Kharge won for a second time in 2014. He, however, lost to the BJP in 2019. In June 2014, Kharge was appointed Leader of the Congress party in the Lok Sabha. He was also the cabinet Minister of Railways and Minister of Labor and Employment at the Centre.
On June 12, 2022, the 78-year-old political stalwart was elected to the Rajya Sabha from Karnataka. He was appointed Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha, a post that he resigned from on October 1, 2022 to contest for the presidential election of Congress.
Since Independence, the Congress has mostly been led by a member of the Gandhi family, who were elected unanimously. Elections were held only six times as there was more than one candidate - starting in 1939 when P Sitaramayya, backed by Mahatma Gandhi, lost to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.
Kharge was always the favourite candidate, widely believed to have the backing of the Gandhis. Now, his election will inevitably provide ammunition to critics, who allege the party will be remote-controlled by the Gandhis.
Kharge's rival in these party elections, Shashi Tharoor, however, maintained during the days of campaigning that the Gandhis had promised him to stay neutral.
Tharoor said he stood for change, something political observers believe the Congress needs urgently.
Tharoor alleged "extremely serious irregularities" soon after the counting of votes began on Wednesday. His campaign team member Salman Soz said they have raised "many different issues" with Congress central election authority chairman Madhusudan Mistry.
This election came about three years after Sonia Gandhi agreed to temporarily lead the party when Rahul Gandhi stepped down, taking responsibility for the two consecutive defeats of the party in the 2014 and 2019 general elections.