By IANS,
New Delhi : Senior leaders of the ruling Congress are to meet Saturday evening to chalk out a political strategy to tackle the situation arising from the unabated inflation and an imminent fuel price hike.
Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, who is not a member of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), has been asked to submit to it a report on the inflation that has touched 8.1 percent. The apex decision making body will also discuss a possible hike in prices of petroleum products in the wake of international crude touching a new high of over $130.
At the meeting, chaired by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, senior leaders are expected to deliberate on political strategies to prepare the party ahead of the upcoming assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi and the 2009 general elections.
This is the first meeting of the CWC after the party faced a humiliating defeat in the recent Karnataka assembly elections, where the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the single largest party paving way for the formation of its first government in south India.
The CWC will also discuss the Left parties’ renewed warning against the move to increase fuel prices. The Communist Party of India-Marxist has asserted that the Left would not discuss the price hike with the government and insisted that the government should restructure the oil tax system instead.