l Will the strategy of inducting rejected former leaders, unfavourable elements and deal based new faces, make the Congress “battle-ready”?
l If the GPCC president’s plan of getting whoever comes and then decide on the ticket in each seat by October is the official formula, then it is clear that the Congress is planning to hand over the next elections to the BJP
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l Did senior most AICC leader P Chidambaram manage to break the fortress created by the GPCC president and his coterie which prevents real ground-level information on the state of the party reaching him?
Is this how you get battle-ready? By inducting rejected and unfavourable elements without asking your workers?
One of the Indian National Congress’ most veteran leaders P Chidambaram feels that his role will be to get the Congress “battle-ready” for the next Assembly elections. But the manner in which the state unit of the Congress is “getting ready” doesn’t give the confidence that their battle is with the BJP. On paper, it may be easy to present candidates, but the majority of the candidates who are going to be brought into the party are only so-called fresh faces or defeated and rejected leaders of other parties. Now we hear that those who have already tasted power from other parties or those who have supported the ruling party are being given backdoor entries, without any consultation with the grassroots workers. This is totally against Mr Chidambaram’s promise that no decisions are going to be taken without consulting the block. In fact, the block unit has openly protested against some recent inclusions, with Velim being the prime example.
Meanwhile people have also expressed serious displeasure at reports that the Congress is open to giving tickets to present and former ministers in the BJP government.
When opportunistic elements join the party, who will look at the party? Will it have a future? It surely does not have a credible election strategy. Most importantly, can it sit and plan a vision and a template of governance when it has unfavourable elements, barring very few who have come from a proven social service background and been a part of people’s movements. The induction of controversial leaders, as well as old ones who have been voted out of power, will become more of a nuisance for the party.
This is how the BJP will be directly helped: This plan of saying come one, come all is a sure way of having multiple rebel candidates in each seat
This is easy for everyone to notice. This indiscriminate invitation to all to join the party and then see who the ticket will be given to raises two kinds of suspicions. On what basis will the ticket be given? People are already alleging that the monetary element will play a part. Secondly, those joining the party are surely not doing that to strengthen the party. They want to contest elections and will do so even against the official party candidate. Isn’t that exactly what the BJP wants?
So why is the Congress planning its election strategy as if it was chalked out in BJP’s election room?
Has the BJP handed over its election project to the Goa Congress which seems to be doing a brilliant job? This question is on the lips of many Congress supporters.
If the right message is not conveyed, the Congress will give a ‘great’ performance of 4 seats
If Mr Chidambaram who is the High Command, does not understand this and does not convey this message to the Congress President and working president in Delhi, then Herald predicts that the party will end up with a maximum of 4 seats in the next elections. The message should be clear. The reality is that there will be no consultation with the blocks – that is only a public line and seats will be allotted to lobbies. There will be quota-based allotment to some leaders and their families bringing back family raj.
Remember the Congress after being selected in 2007 was rejected in 2012. It was again backed in 2017, but its leaders betrayed the party. They will be rejected if they continue like this.
This time the respectable press has pointed out all of the Congress’ failures including the “pay to stand” offer that may be given to some candidates. However, when the responsible press offered to convey this in person to him, for the sake of Goa, Mr Chidambaram appeared to be too busy to honour his word of calling and connecting.
The current Goa Congress heads have built a fortress to prevent the leadership to look at the real state of the Goa unit.
The current Goa Congress with the president and his inner coteries have become a fortress between the central leadership and the inner working of the Goa Congress. They are not even allowing the right message to go to the AICC. They seem to have managed the Goa end as well as the Delhi end. We hope that Mr Chidambaram managed to break this fortress and get a glimpse of the reality of his party in Goa.
Good people are not ruling these days because parties do have good local people and parties. If the parties have people not with Goan interests in mind, even if they have Goan leaders, they will never win the heart of the people.
So, inducting more people will not give the Goa Congress victory for itself. But if its intention is a victory for the BJP, then it can go on doing exactly what they doing now, working as BJP’s B team.
