MP polls: Was Digvijaya the reason behind Congress' defeat?

Satyavrat Chaturvedi was once the spokesperson for the all India Congress Committee. Now he speaks mostly for himself or for union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia. He lost no time in declaring AICC general secretary Digvijaya the biggest conspirator responsible for the party’s defeat. His outburst just a day after the Congress’ humiliating defeat in Madhya Pradesh explains why and how his party hurtled down the slope to disaster. Most politicians in the state are familiar with Digvijay’s intriguing ways and even subscribe partially to Satyavrat’s views. But they are appalled that the Bundelkhand leader went public with his views in most offensive language. Two members of parliament from the state Rajesh Nandini and Basori Singh chastened Chaturvedi asking how many MLAs he helped to win. Chaturvedi had wangled tickets for at least 10 supporters. Only one could win. That the Congress is high on leaders and low on followers in the state is just stating the obvious.  It will have no representative in the new Assembly from17 out 51districts. To put it simply , a third of the state no longer trusts the party. Seven leaders—former chief minister Digvijaya Singh, PCC chief Kantilal Bhuria, leader of the Opposition in the outgoing House Ajay Singh, union minister Kamal Nath, the leader of the party’s campaign committee Jyotiraditya Scindia , former PCC chief Suresh Pachauri and, above all, the party’s national vice- president Rahul Gandhi owe an account of their showing in the state where the Congress recorded its second worst performance despite a sizeable rise in vote percentage. [caption id=“attachment_1284255” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Digvijaya Singh. Agencies.[/caption] Its tally of 58 this time around appears much healthy compared to 2003 when it mustered just 38. The Congress got over four per cent more votes over the past elections. At least 35 of its candidates lost despite securing over 95,000 votes. The new crop of debutant voters and heavy turnout at the polling booths meant 41.44 lakh additional votes for the Congress. But it ended up 13 seats down from its past strength of 71. Behind the entire exercise of mobilising grass-root workers under a formula suggested by Rahul Gandhi the six satraps managed to distribute 190 tickets to their followers. Only 46 could eventually win. Digvijaya had secured 46 tickets for his supporters. Only 14, including his son, Jayvardhan Singh, could post a win. Kamal Nath had managed 44 tickets and only nine of his supporters got to the winning post. Only 12 of 43 supporters of star campaigner Scindia were able to win. In Scindia’s magnetic field of Gwalior and Chambal region which extends to Bundelkhand, his supporters had won 13 out of 34 seats in 2008. Now there are only 11. Bhuria who had tried to drop a couple of sitting MLAs to get nominations for his son and niece could not get any of his 10 supporters elected. The party lost all assembly segments in his parliamentary constituency of Jhabua.  Ajay Singh had secured tickets for 29 supporters. Besides him eight could emerge victorious. Worst was the case of Pachauri who was allotted 15 tickets and was asked to enter the fray in Bhojpur. He lost heavily, so did 13 of his supporters. Meenakshi Natrajan, close confidante of Rahul Gandhi had handpicked candidates in her parliamentary constituency Mandsaur. The party lost seven of the eight segments. Significantly the Muslim voters seem to have turned away from the Congress. The Congress was expecting to do well at least at nine seats where the Muslim population wields considerable influence. The BJP humiliated it at Bhopal (central), Jabalpur East, Betul, Khandwa, Indore I, Indore II, Khargone, Ujjain and Narela. Rahul Gandhi who was hands on with the party’s effort through the entire electoral process, apparently failed to judge the impact of the deviation from his stated stand on ticket distribution. Each faction leader manipulated his way through the formula to get his supporter nominated. Gandhi couldn’t check this at any level. The Congress’ efforts were bound to fall short against a concerted BJP campaign. But, its self-obsessed leaders compounded the problem by working at cross purposes. Since the party had decided against nominating a chief ministerial candidate leaving  the eventual decision to the numbers managed by individual leaders each faction leader got busy running the other down. Worse still, Digvijaya Singh and Scindia have got busy talking about Rahul Gandhi’s prime ministerial candidature even while the party is still licking its wounds.