The Sonia team is thus in place and this is the core of the Congress which is expected to tackle the arduous task of revitalising the ailing party. Another major surprise was Sonia retaining all former general secretaries of the AICC and stripping Pranab Mukherjee of his posts as head of the party's economic and foreign affairs cells.

Curiously, Sonia made Kesri a permanent invitee of the CWC and retained Anwar in the panel. Kesri had made a big fuss of being removed as party president while Anwar went against the trend and openly sided with Kesri in those troublesome days.

The post of vice-president has been done away with leaving Prasada only with his CWC membership. V N Gadgil has beenremoved as the party spokesperson and Sonia has made three relatively young and `photogenic' people as the party's spokespersons.

The task of dealing with the media is now in the hands of Salman Khurshid, Ajit Jogi and Ambika Soni, all fluent in English and TV-friendly. The two CWC nominated members sacked are Chief Ministers J B Patnaik and Lalthanhawla with Sangma being the new representative of the North-East in the CWC.

Rao, who promised all support to Sonia is out of the new Congress set-up and none of his followers find a place. Mukherjee's replacement as head of the foreign affairs cell is known Rajiv loyalist Natwar Singh while Manmohan Singh heads the economic cell.

In essence, the new Congress core team is a mixed bag with just Pilot and Sangma representing the younger lot in the CWC and who are now expected to provide a much-needed drive to the Congress activity. Sangma was recently made head of the party's task force while Pilot re-emerges as the favourite trouble-shooter.

Also, Sonia hasabolished the post of joint secretaries in the AICC and replaced the 18 erstwhile joint secretaries with 10 secretaries. Ahmed Patel retains his post as party treasurer. The CWC now has a total of 23 people who can attend all meetings, Sonia as the president, the 10 elected members who won their places last August, seven nominated members, three permanent invitees and two special invitees. While Pilot, Sangma and Shinde were expected elevations (all of them had lost the CWC elections last year), Karunakaran and Motilal Vora have made it to the CWC as permanent invitees with Kesri. Madhavsinh Solanki and Gadgil retain their places as CWC special invitees.

Arjun Singh and M L Fotedar haven't got any additional responsibilities, Fotedar losing out in his battle against R K Dhawan who has been retained both as CWC member and AICC general secretary. Scindia too gets a chance to breathe easy retaining both his posts as AICC general secretary and CWC member.

Two former joint secretaries Anil Mathrani and JairamRamesh have a new role as deputies of the party's foreign affairs cell and the economic cell respectively. The new secretaries of the AICC are: Ramesh Chennithala, Mukul Wasnik, Narayana Swami, Kumari Selja, Sudhir Sawant, Anil Shastri, Imran Kidwai, Usha Meena, S C Vats and Mani Shankar Aiyer. Manmohan Singh, A K Antony, Oscar Fernandes and Meira Kumar stay on as nominated CWC members, all retaining the trust of Sonia.