Implied was the danger of punitive action against possible deviants as Sonia showed she was the queen with every gesture on a day when none of the 1,000-odd delegates left the Siri Fort auditorium in their keenness to savour the new president. By the end of a long session, Congressmen went home in a sense of euphoria keeping the hard task of reviving the party for another day.

And in an atmosphere where Sonia's acts of necessity were being viewed as virtues, only her predecessor Sitaram Kesri brought in a touch of disagreement saying he was moving the resolution to ratify Sonia's election despite his objections. But Kesri's act was a mere 20 minutes in about 12 hours of joy, anticipation and even apprehension about Sonia's moves.

The whip wassoon cracked as Sonia listed her priorities: Return of the grass-root level worker, immediate revival of the party in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, setting up of a task force to implement her decisions, a monitoring committee to report to her directly, restructuring the AICC, PCCs and DCCs, no lethargy between elections, revamping frontal organisations, transparency and accountability in functioning, a committee to provide intellectual inputs for MPs and MLAs, economic growth of 8 per cent and public donations to form bulk of Congress' resources.

If that sounds like a vast agenda on day one, it is. ``This is a vast agenda and it will constructively absorb the energies of our active workers,'' Sonia said in her opening address. However, today the energies were reserved for embarrassingly glowing references to Sonia and her family's sacrifices. She wanted the NSU, the Youth Congress, the Seva Dal and the Mahila Congress to concentrate on ``betterment of society''.

They spoke of herfamily. In the end, it provoked a sharp retort from Sonia as she said in her closing remarks: ``Sycophancy should have no place in the party. We must say what we mean and mean what we say.'' Discipline was another sore point with Sonia making a pointed reference to the behaviour of party MPs and MLAs.

``There has been a marked deterioration in this regard. Our democracy has no room for rowdyism and disruption.'' But the delegates showed little patience with people they were angry with. Party vice-president Jitendra Prasada was hooted down while speaking and the chaos resulted in a minor scuffle involving Prasada's few supporters and many detractors.

Sonia, however, kept the focus on party revival. ``I have come to this office at a critical point in the history of our party. Our numbers in Parliament have dwindled. Our support base among the electorate has been seriously eroded. Some segments of the voters, including our tribals, Dalits and minorities, have drifted from us. We are in danger of losing ourcentral place in the polity of our country as the natural party of governance.''

There was one poignant touch though. Sonia asked former party president PV Narasimha Rao to speak, the first time he was asked to do so on a party platform after being deposed by Kesri in September 1996. Rao was avuncular in style and promised total support to any ``specific'' revival programme Sonia had in mind.

Rajesh Pilot too seems to be on the upswing as Sonia specifically summoned him from home and asked him to speak, which he did. Curiously, Sonia didn't allow any PCC chief to speak today, choosing MPs and other representatives to speak.

Also, there were two important omissions from Sonia today. She ignored PR Das Munshi's request that she call on all former Congressmen to return to the party and she avoided any attack on smaller parties in the political resolution as sought by PC Chacko.

The first means that GK Moopanar's overtures to return to a Sonia-led Congress may have to wait and the second means Sonia isclear on having the United Front on her side. The political resolution concentrates on attacking the BJP, saying it ``is not the master of its own house and it is ultimately the RSS, a fascist organisation, which runs the show''. It also pays attention to where the Congress failed in winning seats and why.

The crux of Sonia's thrust comes in two warnings - one cautioning against blind optimism and the other on lethargy in workers. ``I am no saviour as some of you might want to believe. We must be realistic in our expectations. The revival of the party is going to be a long drawn process, involving sincere hard work, from each an everyone of us.''

The second is more to the point. ``All our political energies seem to be concentrated on elections. In between, lethargy overtakes us. We must resist this. Indiscipline and indifferent performance should have no place in our party. We must be in constant touch with our constituents.''

That is what Congressmen will try to get back to as Sonia gets down tomaking fresh appointments from tomorrow in the party hierarchy.