NEW DELHI: Congress, which reacted to its Haryana debacle by blaming it on EVMs and rejecting the result as “unacceptable”, has decided to pause the line of attack and has turned the focus inwards to look into the role of factional feuds and weaknesses that prevented a win.
The decision was taken at a review meeting convened on Thursday by Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, with the party brass agreeing that it will firm up its position on EVMs as one of the key causes for the electoral loss only after it had gathered “firm evidence” of wrongdoing, sources said.
A statement issued by Kharge’s office later in the evening said the party has decided to depute a technical team to look into complaints and discrepancies noted by candidates. “Congress will issue a detailed response based on the fact-finding team’s report on the counting process and functioning of electronic voting machines,” it said.
To ‘avoid bad optics’, Hooda & Selja not invited to Congress meet
The deliberations, held against the backdrop of supporters of factions led by former Haryana CM B S Hooda and former Union minister Kumari Selja pointing fingers at each other, saw Rahul Gandhi asserting the need for all to bury their differences and unite for the party’s interest. “The party’s interest is paramount,” a source quoted him as saying in the meeting. Fight between rival factions is widely seen to be the major factor in Congress’s defeat.
Hooda, his loyalist and PCC chief Udai Bhan, Selja and her ally Randeep Singh Surjewala were not invited for the meeting, with sources attributing their exclusion to the concern to “avoid bad optics”. The party is planning to carry out booth-level assessment by seeking a report from each candidate to study the factors that played a role in the loss.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Ajay Maken said, “As you all know, as the exit polls and opinion polls had showed, the results were unexpected. There was a lot of difference between the exit polls and the actual results. We discussed what could be the reasons.” On whether infighting had hurt Congress’s chances in the polls, Maken said, “There are various reasons, from EC to internal differences, we have discussed all that and will hold more discussions going forward.”
On Tuesday, party general secretary Jairam Ramesh and spokesperson Pawan Khera had blamed the “slow counting of EVMs” for the party’s defeat to BJP: a bitter surprise which has helped the saffron rival gain momentum and raised doubts about the viability of Congress’s planks — guaranteed MSP purchase of entire farm produce, scrapping of Agnipath scheme, caste census and an “imperilled Constitution”.
The rejection of the outcome, a first for a national party, drew a strong protest from EC, which rejected all the charges and raised eyebrows in independent quarters. BJP, of course, lashed out at Congress.
Besides Kharge and Rahul, general secretary K C Venugopal, senior observers for the polls Ashok Gehlot and Maken, as well as secretaries for the state participated in the review meeting. Party in-charge of the state Deepak Babaria joined the meeting online from Ahmedabad.
