According to highly placed sources, AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi may soon be appointed as working president of the party to help his mother and party president Sonia Gandhi. The stage is being set by the Congress Party for the transition process, say the sources.

The sources also inform that the delegation of responsibilities to Rahul Gandhi is just only a matter of time, as it has been already decided in principle. "But knowing the style of Soniaji (Sonia Gandhi) and Rahulji, I feel all the dates and time frames circulated are still speculative. It can happen soon, but how soon is anybody's guess," a senior Congress leader told.

Sonia, who had returned three month ago from the US after surgery for an undisclosed illness, but which was widely rumoured to be cancer, is said to be keen to delegate some of her administrative charges to Rahul, leaving herself free to look after policy matters alone. Rahul, 41, currently is a general secretary of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) in charge of youth and student wings and a second-term Lok Sabha member from the family bastion Amethi. Another party leader said the decision on the timing of Rahul's assumption will be taken in the family, basically between Sonia and Rahul and may be in consultation with Rahul's sister Priyanka Vadra.

Several Congress leaders, led by general secretary Digvijay Singh had been hailing Rahul as the future prime minister, while Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has mentioned Rahul as a future leader. The concept of working presidents in the party is not new. Arjun Singh was working president at the time of Rajiv Gandhi and Kamalapati Tripathi was the party's first working president during the last years of Indira Gandhi. Now it seems just a matter of time that we will have an youthful leader at the helm of India's oldest party.