Former Goa Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Ravi Naik who lost the north Goa parliamentary elections by a huge margin, on Tuesday, blamed outgoing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for the party's debacle saying that he failed to reach out to people of the country and explain achievements of the UPA government.
“Dr. Manmohan Singh, our Prime Minister should have gone to every State explaining to people about all the good things done by UPA government in 10 years, like Right to Education, Right to Information,” Mr. Naik — who lost by a record margin of 1.04 lakh votes to sitting MP Sripad Naik (BJP) — said at a press conference in Panaji.
BJP won both the seats in Goa, including Catholic-dominated south Goa seat which is traditionally considered a bastion of the Congress.
Refusing to agree that it was the “Modi-wave” that decimated Congress, Mr. Naik, alleged that the BJP with the help of money and media succeeded in creating an anti-Congress atmosphere across the country over a period of time, from which the Congress failed to come out.
“When global economy was facing recession, UPA government kept the country's economy stable. There are several pro-people and pro-poor people schemes and legislations introduced by Congress-led government. The Prime Minister should have explained it to the people,” Mr. Naik said.
Mr. Naik, an OBC leader, emphatically said that the Congress failed to go to the grass-root level (booth-level) with their achievements and connect to the people. He also lamented that the Congress organisation had virtually collapsed in Goa.
In Goa as well as in bigger States such as Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, division of secular votes among too many parties favoured BJP, said the Congress leader.
In reply to a question, Mr. Naik described victory and defeat as cycles and refused to believe that the current results indicate and end of the Congress in Goa.
He was confident that the people will vote Congress back to power in 2017 State Legislative Assembly elections.
“The BJP government's performance for last two years has been negative, which is a factor that will work in favour of Congress,” Mr. Naik claimed.
