Congress reviews defeat in Haryana
Reacting to its Haryana crisis by attributing it to EVMs and rejecting the outcome as “unacceptable,” Congress has decided to stop the line of attack and switch the attention inward to investigate the part factional conflicts and shortcomings prevented from a win plays.
After Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge called a review meeting on Thursday, the party brass agreed that it will solidify its stance on EVMs as one of the main causes for the electoral loss only after it had gathered “firm evidence” of wrongdoing, sources said.
Later in the evening, Kharge’s office released a statement stating the party has decided to send a technical team to investigate candidate concerns and disparities seen. “Based on the report on the counting process and operation of electronic voting machines by the fact-finding team, Congress will provide a thorough reaction,” it stated.
Held against the background of supporters of factions headed by former Haryana CM B S Hooda and former Union minister Kumari Selja pointing fingers at each other, the discussions saw Rahul Gandhi advocating the need for everybody to bury their differences and unify for the party’s sake. “The party’s interest is paramount,” a source cited him as saying at the meeting. Most people agree that the main reason Congress lost was conflict between competing groups.
Sources said that Hooda, his loyalist and PCC president Udai Bhan, Selja and her ally Randeep Singh Surjewala were not invited for the conference for concerns about “avoid bad optics.” Seeking a report from every candidate to examine the elements contributing to the defeat, the party intends to do booth-level examination.
Ajay Maken told reporters during the conference, “As you all know, the results were surprising based on the exit surveys and opinion polls. The official results and the exit polls differed greatly. We spoke about several possible explanations. Regarding if infighting had harmed Congress’s poll results, Maken remarked, “There are various reasons, from EC to internal differences, we have discussed all that and will hold more discussions going forward.”
A bitter surprise which has helped the saffron rival gain momentum and cast questions on the viability of Congress’s planks — guaranteed MSP purchase of entire farm produce, scrapping of Agnipath scheme, caste census and a “imperilled Constitution”—party general secretary Jairam Ramesh and spokesperson Pawan Khera blamed the “slow counting of EVMs” for the party’s defeat to BJP.
First for a national party, the result was rejected, and EC strongly protested, rejecting all the accusations and drawing eyebrows in independent circles. Of course, BJP turned on Congress.
Apart from Kharge and Rahul, general secretary K C Venugopal, senior observers for the elections Ashok Gehlot and Maken, as well as state secretaries attended the review meeting. From Ahmedabad, the party in charge of the state Deepak Babaria attended the conference virtually.
