Sonia Gandhi, the former Parliamentary Chairperson of the INC, succeeded her husband Rajiv Gandhi as the Congress President in 1998 and has remained in that post till mid of December 2017. The leaders of the INC, who are also their representatives and national executives, are: The Congress Working Committee is the highest decision-making body of the INC. This structured working of the party lends unity, show of strength and effort to rule across India. Together, the delegates of the PCCs form the All India Congress Committee (AICC). The Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) is the smallest functional unit of the Congress, present at the state-level in every state or Pradesh. The working of the Congress, which follows various ranks within its organisational structure, is also representative of the energy and efforts needed to function as a party. The Congress, according to its symbol, works in unity with the members and the masses, thereby forming a strong party. The Congress is the largest democratic party in the country with the largest number of members and party worker. The hand is symbolic of strength, energy and unity. The present hand symbol was first used by Indira Gandhi as she split from the old faction and created the New Congress.
The symbol of the original Congress, founded in 1885 was different - it had a symbol of ‘two bullocks with plough’.
This election symbol is significant as it was selected by the Indira Gandhi-led Congress. It is usually seen in the centre of an Indian flag, which forms its background.The fingers of the hand are pressed together. The Election Symbol of the Congress party, as approved by the Election Commission of India, is the “right hand”, with its palm-side facing front. Thereafter, the Congress lost to BJP in every subsequent state elections in 2014. The BJP registered a landslide victory in the elections, accounting for 282 seats on its own. The Congress had to face a drubbing in the 2014 Indian General Elections, winning only 44 seats out of the 543 Lok Sabha seats. Manmohan Singh was chosen again as the Prime Minister of India, and represents. The 2009 elections made the Congress form the United Progressive Alliance (UPA). The Congress has won General Elections a number of times in the country. The Nehru-Gandhi legacy has percolated to the party’s top leadership even today. The present President of the INC is Rahul Gandhi, son of Former President Sonia Gandhi. Indira Gandhi’s authoritarian rule led to the first electoral defeat of the Congress at the hands of the Janata Party in 1977. She lifted the emergency in 1977 when fresh elections were held. In the face of severe opposition, she proclaimed National Emergency in 1975.
But she gradually became autocratic and dictatorial in her approach, as the Congress President as well as the PM of India, leading to factionalism within the Congress party. His daughter Indira Gandhi became his political successor. With the independence of India in 1947 and the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru became the sole undisputed head of the INC in independent India. In the final years of the British rule, the Congress became synonymous with the leadership and spiritual guidance of Mahatma Gandhi. The Congress became increasingly popular among the masses, though with years, it began to identify itself with the big business houses of the Tatas and the Birlas. Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Jayaprakash Narayan, Jivatram Kripalani, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Rajendra Prasad and others embraced the Gandhian policy of Satyagraha and his concept of non-violence. With Mahatma Gandhi adorning the centre stage of Indian freedom struggle, a number of other members of the Congress joined the freedom struggle. The Congress is credited with a number of historic demands and movements of the freedom struggle. Though it began as a political party, the INC was symbolic of the largest vehicle of the Indian National Movement in the pre-independence era, being the sole representative of the people of the country and representing social reform causes and human progress. Liberal nationalism became the war-cry of the Congress, drawing to it more than 15 million members and triple the number of participants in the anti-imperialist struggle. Hume, established the Indian National Congress to obtain greater share of Indians in the British government. Ranade, Womesh Chandra Bonnerjee, Dinshaw Wacha, Monomohun Ghose and William Wedderburn, headed by A.O. Members of the Theosophical Society, namely Dadabhai Naoroji, Surendranath Banerjee, M.G.