Dibrugarh, June 13: Assam Congress leaders, including those from the tea community, are camping in New Delhi to ensure inclusion of veteran Dibrugarh MP Paban Singh Ghatowar in Manmohan Singh’s council of ministers.

The Prime Minister is likely to shuffle his team by the end of this month. This will be his second after the one he carried out in January to boost the image of the UPA, which has been surrounded by charges of corruption, and give a fresh push to the implementation of development schemes.

Congress insiders said other than Ghatowar, the name of Assam PCC president Bhubaneswar Kalita was also doing the rounds for having contributed in ensuring a third straight term for the party in Dispur.

DoNER minister B.K. Handique is already there and is likely to stay because the party did well in Upper Assam winning all seats in his Jorhat parliamentary constituency.

“Moreover, he has also emerged as a troubleshooter in neighbouring states such as Arunachal Pradesh,” a source said. However, only one would make it, party insiders said. It is not unusual for supporters of senior politicians to make a beeline for Delhi to lobby because the party is high command driven.

Similar scenes were witnessed when chief minister Tarun Gogoi was to constitute his council of ministers, one of them said.

“Ghatowar had helped us tremendously during the elections. Now it is our job to see that he gets a berth in the UPA government,” a party leader from Upper Assam said.

In fact, barring state power and industry minister and Margherita MLA Pradyut Bordoloi, all Congress ministers and MLAs from Tinsukia and Dibrugarh districts left for the national capital yesterday and today on flights from Dibrugarh and Guwahati. They intend to put their weight behind the tea tribe leader, who has been a former minister in the Union cabinet.

Bordoloi is expected to join the pro-Ghatowar lobby within a day or two. The main objective will be seek meetings with UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to press for Ghatowar’s inclusion in the cabinet.

“Ghatowar, who is the chief whip of the Congress Parliamentary Party in the Lok Sabha, is also president of the Asom Chah Mazdoor Sangha. The ACMS, the largest trade union in Asia in the plantation sector has always been lenient towards the Congress and several of its leaders are also leaders, ministers and MLAs of the Congress. And since the party had done well in the tea belt in the Assembly elections this year, the wind is in favour of Ghatowar,” the source said.