Haryana CLP authorizes Sonia Gandhi to elect leader

The newly elected MLAs of Congress tonight authorized party president Sonia Gandhi to elect the leader of the party's legislature group.

A decision to this effect was taken "unanimously" at a meeting the three AICC observers Prithvi Raj Chavan, Mohsina Kidwai and BK Hariparsad had with all the 40 MLAs separately on the issue of election of leader of CLP.
    
The observers first had a meeting with chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, PCC president Phool Chand Mullana and other leaders before commencing the process of meeting the MLAs individually to ascertain their views.
     
Among other strong contenders for the post of CLP leader-and consequently chief minister--are union minister Selja and Kiran Chaudhary.

The meeting unanimously passed a resolution authorizing Gandhi to name the CLP leader, Chavan told reporters.
    
He said they had met all the MLAs and would report to the party chief in New Delhi.

"We will meet Sonia Gandhi and apprise her of the situation and the deliberations that we had with the legislators," Chavan added.

Chavan refused to take questions on whether any name emerged following the discussions the observers had with the
MLAs or if the party is going for a leadership change.