CM Kiran Kumar Reddy is in New Delhi, in what is his first visit to the national capital after the Congress' defeat in the Kadapa and Pulivendula by-polls.
The Chief Minister met Sonia Gandhi on Saturday in a 25-minute meeting, in which AICC In-Charge Of AP Affairs Ghulam Nabi Azad and Ahmed Patel were also present.
The appointment of the Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee president in AP was one of the issues discussed at the meeting. This is a question that the Congress is taking more seriously than usual this year, thanks to the state's political developments threatening to topple the Congress party into irrelevance in AP.
The question is whether to appoint a leader from Telangana or from coastal Andhra. Telangana leaders, including V Hanumantha Rao, state that the post of a Deputy CM - which the High Command is considering doling out to the Telangana region to make peace with the statehood issue for now - is insignificant.
The Congress has to now look at both caste and region while picking D Srinivas' successor as the PCC president. Botsa Satyanarayana, Sridhar Babu and Suresh Reddy are among the leaders in the fray.
Plus, the candidate who will take over the PCC must be immensely capable of pulling the party out of the rut it is currently stuck in in AP, if the Congress plans to retain its stronghold in the state.
filed in:Congress, N Kiran Kumar Reddy, Sonia Gandhi