Sonia Gandhi, the party’s interim president, green-lighted the matter shortly after she met Shashi Tharoor and a few others on her return following a medical check-up abroad.

The elections for the post of the Congress president will be held next month after a two-year-long back and forth on the subject. The filing of nominations for the post of the president begins in three days.

Mrs Gandhi’s son, Rahul Gandhi, who stepped down from the post of the party chief after the 2019 general election debacle, is insistent on his refusal to contest.

But the leader, who is currently leading the party’s “Bharat Jodo” yatra, still has the backing of a big section of the party’s key leaders, who are hoping that he would change his mind before the elections.

Spurred by a section of Gandhi family loyalists, the Congress units in three states have already called for Mr Gandhi’s nomination as the chief – supporting the suspicion of many that the Gandhis would retain control of the party with or without an election. More such requests are likely to come in as the election gets closer.

Mr Tharoor had earlier hinted at running for Congress president in next month’s polls. Originally a member of the Group of 28 leaders who demanded an organisational overhaul, he has been keeping tabs on the internal election process since.

Last week, he was among the leaders who sought “transparency and fairness” in the poll process in a letter to the AICC central election authority. He was also among the leaders who asked that the list of voters be made public.

This morning, Mr Tharoor had signed a petition by a group of young party members calling for a revamp.

The petition had referred to the party’s “Udaipur declaration” made in May, which commits to fair elections and rules like one candidate per family and one person per post, besides a five-year cap on party posts.

The Congress’s internal elections will take place against the backdrop of exits by a number of key leaders – including Kapil Sibal, Amarinder Singh and Jitin Prasada. The latest on the list is former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad.