New Delhi: After nearly three decades of having Sitaram Kesri (from 1996 to 1998), a non-Gandhi family leader, as AICC President, now the grand-old Congress party is all set to have another non-Gandhi family leader as the next AICC Chief, going by the developments inside the party.

With Rahul Gandhi showing little interest in heading the party and an aging Sonia Gandhi suffering from health issues, the names of Congress veterans such as Mallikarjun Kharge, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, AICC General Secretary Mukul Wasnik, former Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar and former Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram are doing the rounds for taking over Congress leadership at the National-level.

While Kharge, a veteran Congress leader from Karnataka and currently serving as Opposition Leader in the Rajya Sabha, is the senior-most among all of them, Gehlot, another veteran Congress leader, is currently serving as Rajasthan CM. Mukul Wasnik, the youngest among the lot, is an influential leader from Maharashtra, Meira Kumar is the  daughter of former Deputy Prime Minister late Dr. Babu Jagjivan Ram and P. Chidambaram from Tamil Nadu is among the key leaders in the party think-tank.

After a bunch of promising young Congress leaders such as Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jitin Prasada, Sushmita Deb, RPN Singh, Kuldeep Bishnoi, Ashok Tanwar and Ashok Choudhary quit the party for one reason or the other, the party seems to have lost hope on young leadership.

As such, the Congress is looking at old and loyal war horses such as Kharge, Gehlot, Wasnik, Meira Kumar and Chidambaram to head the party ahead of the crucial 2024 Lok Sabha polls, which is certainly going to be a do or die battle for the over a century old party, that is now struggling for survival due to successive poll  defeats, internal rumblings and top leaders deserting Congress.