Patna, March 10: After suffering a drubbing on the Uttar Pradesh poll turf, the Congress has now focused on Bihar to elect the chief of its state unit.

The Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC) has convened a meeting of Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) delegates to discuss election of its state party chief.

The party’s organisational poll, which began in July last year, is yet to be completed. On February 2, Pradesh Congress election authority chairman B.D. Kalla had announced the poll schedule and said the party’s state president would be elected through a secret ballot, if needed, on February 12. But the date was later postponed to March 11.

Sources said the Congress postponed the date of election keeping in mind the UP polls. “Replacing Choudhary Meh-boob Ali Quaiser, who is the only PCC president representing the minority community, during an election would go against the party’s pro-Muslim stance, especially when the party vociferously stood for 4.5 per cent quota for minorities,” a source said.

“Altogether 586 delegates, apart from the district Congress committee presidents, would attend the meeting tomorrow,” BPCC media co-ordinator H.K. Verma told The Telegraph. Party in-charge Gulchain Singh Charak and Kalla have already arrived in the state capital for the meeting, he said, though refusing to divulge whether or not the election would be held for the post of state president.

“All the delegates would assemble at the state headquarters and pass a unanimous resolution authorising the Congress high command to anoint a new Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee president,” a party leader said on the condition of anonymity. “This has been the party’s tradition and practice to authorise the high command to name the new PCC president,” he added.

The veterans in the party have started lobbying for the top job in the state. Around a dozen odd names are doing the rounds. These names included Quaiser, Ramjatan Sinha, Sadanand Singh, Shakeel Ahmad and Awdhesh Kumar Singh. But the high command is believed is in search of comparatively young blood to lead the party in the next Lok Sabha and Assembly polls to give it fresh vigour in the state.