Congress faltered in Chhattisgarh phase-II

December 09, 2013 11:48 pm | Updated May 12, 2016 05:42 am IST - New Delhi:

In Chhattisgarh, where the arch-rivals fought neck and neck in the just-concluded Assembly election, the Congress performed very well in the first phase — the 18 constituencies in the Bastar region — but the party faltered in the second phase, it was explained by functionaries at a review meeting conducted by Sonia Gandhi here on Monday.

The BJP, sensing it had not done well in the first phase, summoned its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi to address a string of rallies in the second phase, something the Congress failed to counter by getting Ms. Gandhi and party vice-president Rahul Gandhi in to campaign as well during this period, party sources said.

As for Rajasthan, the view was that Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s performance in his first three years was inadequate; in the concluding two years, the slew of welfare measures he took were “too little, too late” to counter the anti-incumbency.

In Delhi, it was acknowledged that the Congress failed to sense the groundswell of support for the Aam Aadmi Party and to counter the people’s anger against inordinately high electricity and water bills.

Present at the meeting were Defence Minister A.K. Antony — the person most associated with election post-mortem — and the observers for the States. They included Union Heath Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, Water Resources Minister Harish Rawat and general secretary Mukul Wasnik.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.