P Chidambaram, Jairam Ramesh, Mani Shankar Aiyar part of Cong's 10-member panel to overhaul communication strategy

 The Congress today formed a 10- member panel to overhaul its communication strategy, and appointed new AICC in-charges for Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand.

P L Punia was made the AICC in-charge for Chhattisgarh, while R P N Singh will look after party affairs in Jharkhand.

Earlier, both these states were handled by B K Hariprasad, who resigned as the All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary recently.

To help improve the party's communication strategy, Congress president Sonia Gandhi formed a new communication strategy group.

Its members include senior leaders Mallikarjun Kharge, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, P Chidambaram, Mani Shankar Aiyar, Jairam Ramesh, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Sushmita Dev.

AICC in-charge of communications department Randeep Surjewala and chairperson of its newly-set up research department Rajeev Gowda have been made its ex-officio members.

"The group will meet daily and assist the communication department of the AICC," a statement from AICC general secretary Janardan Dwivedi said.

Another statement said that Gandhi assigned the task of looking after party affairs in Chhattisgarh to a new team, in place of B K Hariprasad and Bhakta Charan Das.

Besides Punia, the team includes AICC Secretaries Kamleshwar Patel and Arun Oraon.

In Jharkhand, R P N Singh will be assisted by AICC secretaries Umang Singhar and Mainul Haque.