Congress expresses disappointment with poor show in Bihar

Congress party has expressed disappointment with its performance in the Bihar polls. Congress General Secretary Tariq Anwar admitted that his party emerged as the weakest link, preventing Mahagathbandhan from forming a government in Bihar.

New Delhi: After facing a poor strike rate in Bihar Assembly Polls, Congress party, on Thursday expressed disappointment with its performance, while ensuring of revaluation of what went wrong. It also noted that there was a marginal difference in vote share of both the alliances and the issues raised by Mahagathbandhan were being accepted by the people of Bihar.

Congress party contested elections on 70 seats, but it managed to win just 19 out of it, with a strike rate of 27 percent, emerging out as the 'weakest link' in Mahagathbandhan. The analysis says that if Tejaswi Yadav hadn't accepted the demand of Congress party and had negotiated better, than the Grand Alliance's performance may have been better. This prompted its own leaders to point fingers on the party.

When asked about the matter, former Union Minister P Chidambaram said, "Yes, we are disappointed with our performance in Bihar. I'm sure that the Congress Working Committee will review the situation and come up with an official statement of our position. We accept the verdict, and we are disappointed."

However, Chidambaram also slammed the NDA government for the current situation of Bihar in terms of development, saying, "Bihar is the poorest state of India. Mr Narendra Modi has been the Prime Minister of India since 2014 and Mr Nitish Kumar has been the Chief Minister since 2005."

"Yet, Bihar is the poorest state in India. The poorest state of India, as I agree in alternate analysis, voted for no change in the Government, or pretty close to change in the Government. The vote difference is 0.3 percent. They came close but they did not change the Government," he further added.

The Congress leader even explained that NDA got 37.26 percent of the vote score while the Mahagathbandhan got 37.23 percent of the vote score. The 0.3 percent difference translates into 125 and 110. "That's the consequence of the winner past the post system, we have in India. If we had a system of proportional representation, results would have been different," he claimed.

Agreeing to his viewpoint, Congress MP Jairam Ramesh said, "The mandate is even not in favour of Chief Minister. The difference in vote share is very minimal. It is true that Congress should have performed much better. But saying that the issues raised by Mahagathbandhan were rejected by the people, would be wrong."

It is being expected that the poor performance in Bihar will also have an impact on other states where Congress is eyeing a coalition including Tamil Nadu and West Bengal. Voices within the party are blaming the leadership over wrong selection of seats, faulty tickets distribution and sidelining of local leaders, which contributed majorly to the downfall of Congress in Bihar elections.

Earlier today, Congress General Secretary Tariq Anwar admitted that his party emerged as the weakest link, preventing Mahagathbandhan from forming a government in Bihar.

He tweeted, "We must accept the truth. Because of the poor performance of Congress, Bihar had been deprived of a Mahagathbandhan government. Congress must introspect as to where it faltered. Also, the entry of AIMIM in Bihar is not a good sign."

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