Congress upset after Bastar by-poll defeat

Raipur, May 13, 2011

Shocked by Bastar by-election result, the PCC president Nandkumar Patel on Friday said that the Congress never anticipated loss as the swing in the tribal-populated Lok Sabha constituency indicated his party’s fair chances to reclaim the seat. Accepting the verdict of the people of Bastar, he said, “We will introspect what went wrong during our poll campaign and try to win the next election,” he said.

Patel said Congress fought the election unitedly but BJP being in power affected the results.

He said the ruling party misused the government machinery in the by-poll which eventually helped it to get lead in Kondagaon and Narayanpur. “We had even lodged complaint in this regard with the police but no action was taken against the BJP ministers who were handling the poll management and coordination job,” he said.

“Besides, majority of the voters could not cast their votes because the locations of over 200 polling booths were shifted elsewhere,” he said alleging that the government deliberately changed the booths under its planned conspiracy to prevent Congress supporters to cast their vote. “How can you expect people to walk 25-30 kilometers to cast their vote?” he asked.

Pointing out towards low turnouts in Konta and Bijapur, he said, “We had edge over BJP in these two areas but people refrained from using their voting power in the backdrop of naxal and salva judum supporters’ terror.”

He further cited migration of large number of Bastarians to adjoining states a key factor that debilitated chances of Congress to win the seat. “The BJP’s wrong policies compelled people to leave their homeland. These people moved to neighbouring states, especially Odisha and Andhra Pradesh in search of employment,” he said.

The Konta legislator and party’s candidate in the by-poll Kawasi Lakhma admitted that there were some lacunae in the Congress poll strategy that proved to be advantageous for BJP.

The leader of Congress Legislators’ Party (CLP) Ravindra Choubey and former Chief Minister Ajit Jogi slammed the BJP for misusing local machinery for its benefit. They said the BJP won the election by adopting undemocratic tactics.

The Pradesh Mahila Congress (PMC) president Vani Rao and general secretary Ayesha Siddiqui said the BJP regained Bastar seat by on the basis of power, money and terror. They alleged that the ruling party tempered electronic voting machines (EVMs) of several polling booths.