With just weeks to go before the high-stakes Bihar Assembly elections, the Congress on Wednesday convened its extended Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting in Patna — the first such gathering in the state since 1940.

The meeting began at 10 am at the iconic Sadaqat Ashram, a landmark of India’s Independence movement where Mahatma Gandhi, Rajendra Prasad, and Jawaharlal Nehru once planned freedom struggles including the Champaran Satyagraha. Nearly 170 committee members, including party president Mallikarjun Kharge, Sonia Gandhi, and Rahul Gandhi, were present, underscoring the symbolic and political weight of the event.

According to party sources, the CWC will send a strong message on the issue of “vote chori” (voter theft) and raise concerns over the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar. The party is also expected to formally thank Rahul Gandhi for leading the 16-day ‘Voter Adhikar Yatra’, which covered 1,300 km across more than 25 districts, keeping voter rights and the SIR issue in the spotlight.

Congress leaders say the Patna meeting aims to replicate the momentum the party built in Telangana, where a similar CWC gathering and rally in 2023 paved the way for its sweeping victory against the Bharat Rashtra Samithi.

Speaking ahead of the meeting, Congress General Secretary KC Venugopal said, “Today, as Bihar again faces a crossroads between the politics of hope, social justice and development on one side, and hatred, violence, unemployment and destruction of the Constitution on the other — our CWC meeting is being held here to send a message to the people of Bihar about our commitment to Bihar's welfare.”

State leaders also drew on the Ashram’s historic significance. Bihar Congress chief Rajesh Ram recalled that freedom fighter Maulana Mazharul Haq had donated 21 acres of land in 1921 to establish Sadaqat Ashram, which became a nerve centre of the freedom struggle. Meanwhile, Bihar in-charge Krishna Allavaru likened the extended CWC meeting to a “new struggle for independence.”

The Congress has announced multiple press conferences across 20 districts to highlight alleged voter theft and launch its ‘Ghar Ghar Adhikar Abhiyan’ (Rights for Every Home campaign).

The meeting also took stock of national concerns, including inflation, unemployment, atrocities against women, and what the party termed as the government’s “diplomatic failures.”

The political context in Bihar remains fluid as the opposition Mahagathbandhan continues seat-sharing talks ahead of the polls. In the 2020 elections, the alliance fell short of a majority, with analysts pointing to Congress’s poor strike rate as a key factor in the defeat.

Election dates are expected to be announced in the first week of October after Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s visit. Polling for the 243-member assembly is likely in October or November, with the Mahagathbandhan hoping to unseat the Nitish Kumar-led NDA government.