The struggle for supremacy between the Old Guards and the Young Turks is not a recent phenomenon, rather it’s rooted in the Congress culture which goes back more than a century ago. The earliest reference of such a struggle can be traced to the Swadeshi movement of 1905-06 when the extremists under the leadership of Tilak challenged the Moderates led by Gokhale and Mehta.
Although being thrown out of Congress in the Surat Split, Tilak and his Extremist comrades created a niche for themselves in the national politics. Their revolt proved to be an end to the monotonous practice of prayers and petitions advocated by the Moderates. They brought a more belligerent approach to national politics and after it, there was no looking back. In fact, their idea of passive resistance was later even co-opted by Gandhi. 
In the post-independence history, the most notable revolt was witnessed in 1969 when Indira Gandhi sought to break away from the clutches of Syndicate and cast an independent path of hers. This time Mrs. Gandhi not just got better of her senior rivals but set out to completely destroy their political capital by launching an ideological offensive against them. Using the pretext of Presidential elections, she broke the party and successfully established herself as the tallest leader of the time.
Her sons Sanjay and Rajeev also realized early on that they need to finish up the old guards in order to survive in office. While Sanjay in his extraconstitutional position successfully marginalized Indira’s old ministers, Rajeev got his space cleared by throwing out rivals to the throne-like Pranab Mukherjee.
What all can be concluded from the above examples is the following: 1. The struggle between Old Guard and Young Turks has been a natural phenomenon, where the old ones want to hold on to their privileges by blocking the path of new ones.
2. Given the status quo nature of the Old Guard, the Young Turks are left with the only option of an open revolt by which they could establish themselves.
3. The revolt, in fact, turns out to be a booster for the profiling of the leader. They thus get legitimacy among the public, as they have “earned” their due instead of it being a “privilege”. Remember nobody dares to call Indira Gandhi a dynast even today.
Now shifting our focus from past to present day. It’s quite clear that the problem basically lies in the perception that Rahul Gandhi doesn’t have the qualities to rule the Congress party and frankly Rahul hasn’t done enough to get rid of such a perception. This negative perception coupled with aggressive propaganda machinery by the BJP has completely decimated the image of Rahul Gandhi within Congress itself. Although the leaders may claim loyalty to Rahul Gandhi in public, it’s an open secret that nobody really values him. Such circumstances lead the Old Guard to exercise disproportionate influence in the crucial decision making of the party. Their powerful syndicate comprising the likes of Ahmed Patel, Gulab Nabi Azad, Ashok Gehlot, Digvijay Singh, Kamal Nath, etc quite easily force upon their will in crucial matters. This could be seen very well when Rahul Gandhi’s men, Scindia and Pilot, lost the opportunity of Chief Ministership in 2018 to the leaders of the Old Guard. Rahul Gandhi presently is in such a precarious position that he can’t even ensure the well being of his loyalists and friends like Scindia and Pilot.
The gradual dismantling of Rahul’s men by the Old Guard is a sign of the political weakness of Rahul Gandhi. He needs to come out of his privileged, nepotistic background and fight the real political battles both within and outside the party in order to gain legitimacy. What Rahul could do is to take a leaf out of his predecessors in how to counter the older generation and put forward his own vision. Otherwise, Congress seems to be a sinking ship, from which the older leaders survive themselves using the lifeboats. They know very well that they have limited time, which can easily be covered by lifeboats, and a new “pilot” for the ship isn’t required.